Description:

The Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics presents:

Ting Wang, Inaugural Sanford and Karen Loewentheil Distinguished Professor of Medicine

Department of Genetics, Washington University, St Louis

Title: Transposable Elements and Epigenome Evolution

Transposable elements (TE) make up about half of our genome, yet they are understudied due to their repetitive nature and are called “junk DNA”. However, they are an abundant and rich genetic resource of regulatory sequences. Modern genomics provided us an opportunity to interrogate their contribution to genome and epigenome evolution. I will discuss advances made over the last decade in recognizing TE’s role in innovating gene regulatory network, and more recent findings illustrating how TEs provide genetic redundancy in maintaining genome architecture, and how TE’s deregulation accelerates cancer epigenome evolution.