UMSL Genomics:Research

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RNA Virus Discovery In Wild Birds of Northeastern Brazil

This research will be performed to help prediction and prevention of outbreak that could affect avifauna. We will use RNA-Seq to identify novel viral agents in wild birds. For this we will use RNA extracted from cloacae and oropharyngeal swabs from different bird species of `Caatinga` and Atlantic Forest biomes of Northeastern Brazil. RNA will be purified, reverse-transcribed into cDNA, and sequenced using the Illumina platform. The goal is to identify putative viral agents by using the Trinity program to assemble transcriptomes de novo from RNA-seq data and command-line BLAST to differentiate between bird and virus contigs.

Groucho

Circadian clocks exist in many organisms and are rhythmically regulating expression of genes responsible for a variety of cellular processes. The Groucho gene is very important in the early stages of development in fruit flies and it is known to be rhythmically expressed in the fly brain. How Groucho is regulating circadian genes is less clear. Using RNAi, knock down experiments are performed using genes known to regulate circadian rhythms. The long term goal is identification of genes driven by the circadian clock, the mechanisms through which regulation occurs and how these genes influence behavior.
More specifically,
1. Identification of genes that contribute to regulating Groucho
2. Identification of circadian output genes Groucho has a role in regulating.

UMSL Genomics
Department of Biology
University of Missouri, St. Louis