Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biological Informatics for FY 2000

Ancel, Lauren, San Francisco CA

Investigators

Abstract

This action funds an NSF Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in Biological Informatics for 2000. The research and training plan is in the area of Evolution of Developmental Mechanisms and is entitled "Evolvability and Modularity of Molecules, Viruses, and Regulatory Networks". Plastogenetic congruence, a correlation between environment-induced and mutation-induced phenotypes, has been shown by computational studies of RNA secondary structure evolution. This correlation, where phenotypes produced by an RNA sequence under thermodynamic fluctuation mirror those produced by genetic mutation, has profound evolutionary implications as RNA sequences undergo environmental canalization towards more thermodynamically stable structures. Assuming that the rule of plastogenetic congruence is followed, phenotypes that are resistant to environmental changes must also resistant to mutation-induced changes and the ensuing novel phenotypes. Essentially, phenotypes will reach evolutionary dead-ends. This research applies these principles to develop theoretical frameworks in which to study indirect impacts of a heterogeneous immunological environment on viral evolutionary potential and the origin of modular organization in viruses via analysis of RNA sequence data as well as artificial RNA evolutionary experimentation.