Myong research collaboration explores RNA mechanisms

Sua Myong, an assistant professor of bioengineering, and her collaborators, have received with a Research Grant from the Human Frontier Science Program to provide insights into the mechanisms underlying dynamic RNP-mediated RNA regulation.

The $300,000 per year grant of will fund the project, "RNA Helicases in RNA/protein Body Assembly and Function: a Multi-scale Approach," which Myong describes as a "common goal to understand how the molecular activities of RNA helicases play a role in the assembly and biophysical features of nuclear and cytoplasmic RNA/protein (RNP) bodies, and how these structures contribute to the control of diverse RNA regulatory gene expression programs of a developing tissue.

To develop a fundamental understanding of the nature and functional consequences of large scale RNP assemblies, we employ a broad range of interdisciplinary experimental techniques, and exploit the benefits of two complementary developmental model organisms, Caenorhabditis elegans and Xenopus laevis," explained Myong, who is a researcher with the Institute for Genomic Biology at Illinois.

Project collaborators include Principal Investigator Christian Eckmann (Eckmann Labs, Dresden, Germany), whose expertise in RNA/protein interactions and developmental gene expression, will enable Clifford Brangwynne (Princeton University) to assign the contribution of individual helicases to mesoscale biophysical properties of RNP bodies, and Myong to conduct single molecule studies on physiologically relevant helicase/RNA partners and developmentally important cofactors.

As outlined in the grant proposal, Myong's single molecule expertise offers Eckmann and Brangwynne an extended dimension through which systems biology parameters and biophysical properties of RNP bodies are tested, assayed, and interpreted at the level of single molecule dynamics of individual helicases. Furthermore, Brangwynnes ability to interrogate the biophysical properties of large-scale RNA helicase assemblies opens up a new avenue for Myong and Eckmann to investigate the consequences of RNA-protein interactions for the mesoscale properties of RNP bodies.
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Contact: Sua Myong, Department of Bioengineering, 217/244-6703.

Writer: Jenny Amos, Department of BioEngineering, 217/333-4212.

If you have any questions about the College of Engineering, or other story ideas, contact Rick Kubetz, editor, Engineering Communications Office, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 217/244-7716.