Description of Research Expertise

Our primary research focus is on the regulation of mitochondrial chromatin, and its effect on genome segregation, compaction, and expression. The coordination of these processes is essential for the maintenance and transmission of mitochondrial respiratory function. By analogy to the nuclear genome, whose regulated compaction/decompaction is an essential aspect of replication, transcription and transmission, regulated compaction of the mitochondrial genome is likely to be a key aspect of mitochondrial biology. In vivo, mtDNAs are organized into nucleoids, which are small, suborganellar protein-DNA complexes that contain a few copies of the genome. These structures are present as several hundred distinct foci, depending on cell type. The core of our research lies in determining how the nucleoid is formed and regulated, and how that regulation affects developmental and physiological aspects of mitochondrial function such as tissue-specific segregation of mutant mtDNA. This work has implications in diabetes, aging, heart disease, and mtDNA-borne birth defects.

We have several thrusts in the lab as of now: 1) post-translational regulation of mtDNA compaction 2) genes involved in the somatic segregation of mtDNA alleles, and 3) identification and characterization of protein-mtDNA complexes.