This award, co-funded by the Brazil Program and the Eukaryotic Genetics Program, supports cooperative research in biology to be conducted by Dr. Joyce L. Hamlin of the University of Virginia School of Medicine and Dr. Francisco J.S. Lara of the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil. The focus of the research is to gain an understanding of replication in complex eukaryotic genomes. The project will study the control of replication of the DNA puff regions in the salivary glands of the sciarid fly, Rhynchosciara americana. The system offers an unusual opportunity to examine special regulatory controls over replication that are exercised during development. The collaboration between the two laboratories is synergistic, thereby allowing studies that would be impossible to carry out in either of the individual groups. The Hamlin group offers expertise in molecular biology while the Lara group is expert in all aspects of the biology of Rhynchosciara.
