NCBC Grant Awarded to CCGS Collaboration

March 30, 2006

An interdisciplinary group of researchers at UNC was awarded a two-year $275,000 seed grant from the North Carolina Biotechnology Center (NCBC) to fund their innovative approach to chromatin structure and function. This NCBC grant mechanism is specifically designed to support new collaborative research projects involving three or more North Carolina scientists from different disciplines. The CCGS has catalyzed a number of collaborative groups across campus to address the growing demand for multi-investigator, interdisciplinary research. One such group is the chromosome biology community at UNC, which has an established reputation in chromosome structure, imaging, genetics, and biochemistry. The CCGS recognized this experimental strength and identified opportunities for other faculty with computational and theoretical expertise to create a totally new approach in this longstanding field of biology. One of the research groups that arose from this effort is now funded by the NCBC seed grant, which will allow them to test and validate their approach.

The focus of the group’s research is to understand how nucleosome stability influences chromatin function, specifically transcriptional potentiation, using a combined experimental and biophysical modeling approach. The team, led by Brian Strahl, is comprised of six faculty who each bring a distinct set of tools and intellectual backgrounds to the project:

Brian Strahl, PhD (PI) - Assistant Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics. Expertise: chromatin biochemistry, post-translational modification of histones, transcription.

Kerry Bloom, PhD - Professor of Biology. Expertise: molecular genetics of chromosome segregation, chromosome imaging, microscopy.

Nikolay Dokholyan, PhD - Assistant Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics/CCGS. Expertise: computational and structural biology, protein folding, biophysical modeling.

Mayetri Gupta, PhD - Assistant Professor of Biostatistics/CCGS. Expertise: Bayesian modeling, Monte Carlo methods in statistical computing, and stochastic models for genomic data.

Jason Lieb, PhD - Assistant Professor of Biology/CCGS. Expertise: genomic mapping of protein-DNA interactions, microarrays, transcription.

Garegin Papoian, PhD - Assistant Professor of Chemistry. Expertise: multi-scale computational modeling, protein dynamics, biophysical chemistry.

The NCBC grant provides the much-needed initial support to generate preliminary data and validate the group’s novel approach. Down the road, this competitive advantage will certainly increase the likelihood of securing more substantial, long-term funding from federal agencies such as NIH or NSF.



		March 30, 2006 An interdisciplinary group of researchers at UNC was awarded a two-year $275,000 seed grant from the North Carolina Biotechnology Center (NCBC) to fund their innovative approach to chromatin structure and function. This NCBC grant mechanism is specifically designed to support new collaborative research projects involving three or more North Carolina scientists from different disciplines. The CCGS has catalyzed a number of collaborative groups across campus to address the growing demand for multi-investigator, interdisciplinary research. One such group is the chromosome biology community at UNC, which has an established reputation in chromosome structure, imaging, genetics, and biochemistry. The CCGS recognized this experimental strength and identified opportunities for other faculty with computational and theoretical expertise to create a totally new approach in this longstanding field of biology. One of the research groups that arose from this effort is now funded by the NCBC seed grant, which will allow them to test and validate their approach. The focus of the group’s research is to understand how nucleosome stability influences chromatin function, specifically transcriptional potentiation, using a combined experimental and biophysical modeling approach. The team, led by Brian Strahl, is comprised of six faculty who each bring a distinct set of tools and intellectual backgrounds to the project: Brian Strahl, PhD (PI) - Assistant Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics. Expertise: chromatin biochemistry, post-translational modification of histones, transcription. Kerry Bloom, PhD - Professor of Biology. Expertise: molecular genetics of chromosome segregation, chromosome imaging, microscopy. Nikolay Dokholyan, PhD - Assistant Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics/CCGS. Expertise: computational and structural biology, protein folding, biophysical modeling. Mayetri Gupta, PhD - Assistant Professor of Biostatistics/CCGS. Expertise: Bayesian modeling, Monte Carlo methods in statistical computing, and stochastic models for genomic data. Jason Lieb, PhD - Assistant Professor of Biology/CCGS. Expertise: genomic mapping of protein-DNA interactions, microarrays, transcription. Garegin Papoian, PhD - Assistant Professor of Chemistry. Expertise: multi-scale computational modeling, protein dynamics, biophysical chemistry. The NCBC grant provides the much-needed initial support to generate preliminary data and validate the group’s novel approach. Down the road, this competitive advantage will certainly increase the likelihood of securing more substantial, long-term funding from federal agencies such as NIH or NSF.