Health center awards $4 million to project led by Iowa State scientists to advance zebrafish genetics research

AMES, Iowa – Tropical freshwater zebras (Danio rerio) is widely used as a model biological system for researchers studying human life. Like humans, zebras are vertebrates that share the same respiratory and reproductive organs. Amazingly, this species shares 70% of its genome with humans. It also produces large numbers of embryos that appear to develop quickly, making the effects of genetic modification easier to see. Despite these advantages, scientists still lack the special genetic tools to use this powerful animal model for health studies.

A research team led by two Iowa State University geneticists has made significant progress in solving this problem over the past decade. The National Institutes of Health recently recognized their leadership with a grant of approximately $4 million over four years, allowing them to improve the tools they have developed and continue training and development. support other researchers and students who apply science.

Maura McGrail, a professor of genetics, development and cell biology, is leading the new NIH project, working with her longtime partner in the lab and in life, Jeffrey Essner, a professor in the same department. A scientific duo has created a state-of-the-art zebrafish discovery platform to research the genetics of health and disease.

With this new funding, they plan to build on their previous work to better understand the enzymes inside cells that help regulate genome activity, sometimes over generations. Another focus will be examining the biology of metabolic disease, particularly problems with mitochondria, the tiny organelles inside cells where most of the processes of respiration and energy production take place. Dysregulation of the genome and mitochondria can lead to many diseases in humans and other animals.

“Our overall goal is to continue to advance zebrafish as a model for human health research by opening up new areas of research related to genetics and disease,” said McGrail. . “This research is very applicable to other model systems, including humans, other animals and even plants.”

For this project, they are collaborating with Iddo Friedberg, assistant professor in the Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine at Iowa State. Friedberg is a computational biologist who will help develop software to put their genetic sequences in the right places. Other partners in the new NIH project include Stephen C. Ekker at the University of Texas at Austin and Karl J. Clark at Texas A&M University.

This project builds on McGrail and Essner’s past ten years of NIH funding and seven collaborative publications on the development of CRISPR (frequently spliced ​​short palindromic repeats ) for genome engineering. The latest advances in CRISPR-edited genes from McGrail’s lab are updates to the proposed new grant research. Transgenic genes have a component inserted into their DNA that allows precise control of where and when the mutation occurs in the animal. With this critical advance, genes can now be studied in specific cells and organs, to better understand how they contribute to human disease.

Funding for the zebra center at Iowa State was largely supported by the Roy J. Carver Charitable Trust.

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Names:

Maura McGrail, Department of Genetics, Developmental and Cell Biology, 515-294-4445, mmcgrail@iastate.edu

Jeffrey Essner, Department of Genetics, Developmental and Cell Biology, 515-294-7133, jessner@iastate.edu

Iddo Friedberg, Department of Veterinary Microbiology and Preventive Medicine, 515-294-5959, idoerg@iastate.edu

Ann Y. Robinson, Agricultural and Life Sciences Communications, 515-294-3066, ayr@iastate.edu