Joel Mackay and Jacqui Matthews – with collaborators
The proper regulation of gene expression is a fundamental requirement for the development and ongoing homoeostasis of every organism. Although five decades of work have led to great advances, many of the mechanistic principles underlying gene regulation remain mysterious.
However, the development in recent years of many powerful methodologies across the disciplines of structural, molecular and cell biology – ranging from cryoEM to CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing and next-generation sequencing – offers us the opportunity to make significant advances in understanding gene regulation.
In collaboration with labs in Australia and around the world, we are combining biophysics, biochemistry and molecular and cell biology to identify the molecular underpinnings of gene regulation – with a particular focus on transcriptional regulation. We hope that the results of these endeavours will begin to provide a molecular framework that describes how the proteins involved in regulating a process such as blood cell development cooperate to bring about the expression of the appropriate genes.