The International Research Fellowship Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct three to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad.
This award will support a twenty-four month research fellowship by Dr. Jonathan N. FitzGerald to work with Dr. Frederic Berger at Ecole Normale Superieure de Lyon in Lyon, France.
In animals, the pattern of the developing embryo is established by the activity of the Polycomb group (PcG) and Trithorax group (TxG) chromatin remodeling complexes. In Arabidopsis thaliana, the high resolution time-lapse 3D confocal microscopy techniques developed in the host lab enable visualization of PcG action in the developing seed. With this powerful experimental system the host lab is poised for studying gene regulation and patterning by this important class of DNA modifying complexes. The PI plans to isolate and genetically characterize a novel Arabidopsis TxG-like activity, KRONOS, that has been identified in the host lab. Proposed functional studies of KRONOS will further our mechanistic understanding of chromatin regulation during development.
