Research / Clinical
Summary
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Bing Ren, PhD
Professor, Cellular & Molecular Medicine
Cancer Genes and Genome Program
Contact by Email
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Diseases/Research Topics
Apoptosis, B Lymphocyte Development, Basic Cell Biology, Bioengineering, Bioinformatics, Breast Cancer, Cancer, Carcinogenesis, Cell & Developmental Biology, Cell Biology, Computation, Computational Biology, Control of Differentiation and Development, Differentiation, Gene Expression, Gene Regulation, Genetics, Genomic biology, Genomics, Glioblastoma Carcinoma, Growth Control, Mammalian Cancer Genetics, Model Systems, Molecular Biology, Molecular Genetics, Mouse, Mouse Cancer Genetics, p53, Pharmacogenomics
Genomics, Prostate Cancer, Tumor, Tumor Supressor Genes
Dr. Ren's laboratory is interested in understanding how the complex gene regulatory networks in mammalian cells control cellular proliferation and differentiation. The research is divided into two general areas:
1. The development of genomics and bioinformatics tools that allow genome wide identification of regulatory targets for transcription factors;
2. The application of these tools to study of transcription factors that play critical roles in tumorigenesis.
Many transcription factors are involved in tumorigenesis, and identifying their target genes is necessary to understand the molecular basis of cancer. Genome wide location analysis (GWLA) has proved to be a valuable tool to study these transcription factors. GWLA is a novel approach to study the in vivo function of transcription factors.
It combines the chromatin immunoprecipitation method with DNA microarrays to reveal the binding sites of DNA-binding proteins in living cells. It has been successfully used to identify target genes for two well-characterized yeast transcription factors Gal4 and Ste12. More recently, GWLA has also been successfully applied to study of human transcription factors. For example, the E2F transcription factor family plays a key role in cell cycle progression by regulating expression of genes involved in DNA replication and cell cycle control. Using GWLA, more than 80 novel E2F target genes were identified.
These new targets suggest that E2F can also control genes involved in DNA damage checkpoint and repair pathways, as well as chromatin assembly/condensation, chromosome segregation, and the mitotic spindle checkpoint. Therefore, E2F appears to directly link cell cycle progression with the coordinate regulation of genes essential for both the synthesis of DNA as well as its surveillance.
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