Jia Fei
Rutgers University-New Brunswick, NJ·Biochemistry
Inside the nucleus, DNA is wrapped around protein spools called nucleosomes. Before a gene can be read, the cell's RNA-making machine has to get past these spools.
- Fields
Biochemistry
Genetics
Biophysics
- Topics
nucleosome destabilization factor
chromatin
RNA Polymerase II
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Nov 2027
What they work on
- Characterize how NDF loosens nucleosomes, the protein spools that package DNA, and helps RNA Polymerase II move through them, using ultra-high-resolution optical tweezers and cryo-electron microscopy.
- Determine how NDF is recruited to actively transcribed gene regions in cells, testing whether factors other than H3K36me3, a chemical tag on histone proteins, help direct it there.
- Find out how genes are transcribed in cells lacking NDF, and identify protein factors related to NDF, using biochemistry, genomics and bioinformatics approaches.
- Develop new methods and strategies for studying the molecular mechanism of NDF-mediated nucleosome destabilization during RNA Polymerase II transcription.
More about the research
How it does so is only partly understood, because many of the helper factors involved are still unknown. Answering this question matters for nearly every biological process, since all of them depend on genes being switched on at the right time and level.
Why it matters
Precise control of gene expression underlies a wide range of biological processes. By explaining how a newly identified factor, NDF, helps RNA Polymerase II read through tightly packaged DNA, this basic research adds to our understanding of how genes in eukaryotic cells (cells with a nucleus) are regulated. That understanding could eventually inform studies of conditions in which gene regulation goes wrong.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Robert G Roeder
Rockefeller University, NY·Biochemistry
Determine how PPARγ, C/EBP pioneer factors and the Mediator complex cooperate at fat-cell enhancers (DNA control regions) to set white and brown fat identity, using in vitro transcription, cross-linking mass spectrometry, multiomics and rapid protein degradation.
Richard Ebright
Rutgers University-New Brunswick, NJ·Biochemistry
Determine structures of intact, functional factor-dependent pre-termination complexes from E. coli and the archaeon Thermococcus kodakarensis by cryo-electron microscopy, defining how the ATP-driven RNA motor Rho and the RNA-cutting enzyme aCPSF1 engage RNA polymerase.
Scott Bailey
Johns Hopkins University, MD·Biochemistry
Determine how CRISPR-associated proteins use small guide RNAs to locate and destroy foreign DNA or RNA in prokaryotes, using cryo-EM structures together with biochemical, biophysical and cell-based assays.
The school
Rutgers University-New Brunswick: 57 labs on PI Pages, $837M a year on research, 713 research doctorates a year.
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