Uc Science Today

Researchers are striving to unveil the secrets about “dark” DNA, part of the genome that does not code proteins, but plays an important role in regulating genes. Scientist Diane Dickel of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has been working on finding all of these non-coding regulators -so called enhancers - and pinning them on a map. “I mean, it is like building a road map and adding information onto that, to point that particular pairs in the genome act as these enhancer elements to regulate gene expression.” This map will help researchers get a better picture of the dark DNA, which could shed a light on whether mutations in the enhancers cause genetic diseases. Dickel says this would also be the next step towards improving genetic testing. “The hope of genetic testing is to try to understand biology of what’s happening in the cell to develop treatments for that longer term." And, give patients clear answers about their health and genetic predispositions. For Science Today, I’m Larissa Brani