During the past decade advances in molecular biology, particularly recombinant DNA and molecular cloning technologies, have had dramatic and wide-reaching effects on many fields of biological research. Several members of the faculty at CSULA have been using these powerful methods to gain important new insights into biological structures and regulation of biological processes. Active research programs exploring the regulation of neuroactive peptide production and release, the expression of actin genes during development, the regulation of membrane development during the sporulation cycle of Bacillus subtilis, the structural definition of viral protein genes in mutant Sendai viruses in order to establish the molecular basis of their biological properties, defining the molecular signals for directing the orientation of viral budding in eukaryotic cells, studies of sub-cellular organization in higher plants, mechanisms of uniparental inheritance of mitochondrial and chloroplast DNA in Chlamydomonas, and studies of mechanisms regulating the expression of phosphate starvation-induction of gene expression in higher plants all depend heavily on the availability of the fundamental infrastructure of a well- equipped recombinant DNA research facility at CSULA. The current facility, largely funded by our currently awarded RIMI grant, located at this urban university with its large and diverse minority enrollment, is providing a center of research excellence that promotes training for minority students and will be a focus for related work at the many neighboring State University Campuses. This application requests continued support for this multi-user research facility, particularly for expanding our capacity to carry out diverse types of tissue culture, and for the individual research programs described above.
