Our research goal is to gain a better understanding of how Hox proteins govern pattern formation during animal development. We use the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster for many of these studies, but we are also using the red flour beetle, Tribolium castanium and more recently, the zebrafish, Danio rerio.
Hox genes:
Hox genes encode highly conserved, related homeodomain-containing proteins that bind to DNA in a sequence specific manner. In most genomes the Hox genes are tightly clustered and, interestingly, are organized such that there is colinearity between the position of a specific gene in the Hox complex and where it governs identity in an organism. Figure 1 is a diagram of the Hox complex from Drosophila and mouse. The colors of each gene correspond with the position of expression in the embryo.
To be continued
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