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George E. Fox
University of HoustonDepartment: Biology & BiochemistryAddress: Unversity of Houston Biol & Biochem, HSC Rm. 424 Houston, TX 77240-5001 Phone: (713) 743-8363 Fax: (713) 743-8351 Email: fox@uh.edu Web: prion.bchs.uh.edu/1/ |
Education
B.S., Chemical Engineering, Syracuse University
Ph.D., Chemical Engineering, Syracuse University
Postdoc, Univ of Illinois in the Dept. of Genetics & Development in the lab of Dr. Carl R. Woese
Honors
2008 NASA Inventions and Contributions Board Award for STITCH
2007 NASA Space Act Award
2006-2011 John & Rebecca Moores Professorship
2005 Sigma Xi Faculty Research Award (UH Chapter)
2002 Elected Fellow, American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering, 2002
1997 University of Houston Research Award (Professor Level),
1995 Elected Fellow, Amer. Association Advancement of Science.
1994 Elected Fellow, American Academy of Microbiology, 1994
Research Topic
RNA structure, function & evolution; bioinformatics
Research Description
Our laboratory is seeking to understand the early evolution of living systems and how a transition from a hypothetical RNA World to living life as we know it might have occurred. We are currently focusing our attention on two problems: (1) the origins of the cellular translation machinery and how it is historically related to other cellular information systems and (2) the extent to which the numerous non-coding RNAs and RNA structures found in mRNAs may or may not be remnants of the RNA World.
The question of origins is being addressed by a combination of approaches relying on both bioinformatics and structural ideas and methods. The key is to identify timing events which reveal the relative age of various molecules and interactions. For example, the order in which ribosomal proteins are assembled into the modern ribosome suggests a relative age for these proteins. Many proteins that have arrived late by this criterion have individual domains that have structural homologs in other systems. Those that have apparently evolved earlier in ribosome history, show evidence of internal duplications and in many cases may be progenitors of individual domains in newer ribosomal components. Connectivity between older regions of the ribosome is likely to be greater than between newer regions. Studies of hydrogen bonding interactions within the RNAs and between the RNAs address connectivity and have allowed us to identify regions of the RNA that are likely older than others.
In order to better understand the relationship between modern RNAs and a possible RNA World we are seeking to determine the phylogenetic distribution of various RNAs and RNA elements. Those that are widely distributed are likely older. The difficulty is that the distribution of these RNAs and RNA elements is not accurately known. We are therefore implementing published methods to find these RNAs and seeking to develop novel more powerful approaches based on structural principles. One aspect of our approach is to study the structure of key RNAs at atomic resolution using NMR This new structural information is used in combination with published data to refine our understanding of RNA structure. This in turn will allow us to develop new RNA search strategies based on the possible presence of RNA specific structural elements in candidate sequence regions. In analogy with work in the protein field, comparison of large scale RNA structures may also provide insight to historical relationships between various RNAs.
Selected Publications
- Huang, H.-C., Nagaswamy, U., and Fox, G.E. (2005). The application of cluster analysis in the inter-comparison of loop structures in RNA. RNA 11: 412-423.
- Zhao, Q., Nagaswamy, U., Lee, H., Xia, Y., Huang, H.-C., Gao, X. and Fox, G.E. (2005). NMR structure and Mg2+ binding of an RNA segment that underlies the L7/L12 stalk in the E. coli 50S ribosomal subunit. Nucleic Acids Res. 33: 3145-3153.
- Tucker, D.L., Karouia, F., Wang, J., Luo, Y., Li, T.B., Willson, R.C., Fofanov, Y., and Fox, G.E. (2005). The effect of an artificial RNA marker on gene expression in Escherichia coli. Applied Environ Microbiol., 71: 4156-4159.
- Putoni, C., Chumakov, S., Mitra, R., Fox, G.E., Willson, R.C., and Fofanov, Y. (2006). Human-blind probes and primers for dengue virus identification: Exhaustive analysis of subsequences present in the human and 83 dengue genome sequences. FEBS J. 273: 398-408.
- Hury. J., Nagaswamy, U., Larios-Sanz, M., and Fox, G.E. (2006). Ribosome origins: the relative age of 23S rRNA domains. Origins Life & Evol. Biosphere. In press.
- Rastogi R, Wu M, Dasgupta I, & Fox GE. (2009). “Visualization of ribosomal RNA operon copy number distribution.” BMC Microbiology, in press.
- Zuo G, Roberts DJ, Lehman SG, Jackson GW, Fox GE, & Willson RC. (2009). “Molecular assessment of salt-tolerant perchlorate- and nitrate-reducing microbial cultures.” Water Research, in press.
- Yerrapragada S, Siefert JL, & Fox GE. (2009). “Horizontal gene transfer in cyanobacterial signature genes.” Methods Mol Biol. 532: 339-366.
- Warmflash D, Chu H, Siefert Jo, & Fox GE. (2009). “Life detection using glucose and tetrasaccharide enantiomer pairs.” Astrobiology. 9: 297-303.
- Wang J, Dasgupta I, & Fox GE. (2009). “Many non-universal Archaeal ribosomal proteins are found in conserved gene clusters.” Archaea, 2: 241-259.
- Añez-Lingerfelt M, Fox GE, & Willson RC. (2009). “Reduction of DNA contamination in RNA samples for reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction using selective precipitation by compaction agents.” Anal Biochem. 384: 79-85.
- Zhang X, Potty ASR, Jackson GW, Stepanov V, Tang A, Liu Y, Strych U, Fox GE, & Willson RC. (2009). “Engineered 5S ribosomal RNAs displaying aptamers recognizing vascular endothelial growth factor and malachite green.” J Molec Recognition, 22:154-161.
- Zhang ZD, Nayar M, Ammons, D, Rampersad J, & Fox GE. (2009). “Rapid in vivo exploration of a 5S rRNA neutral network.” J Microbiol Methods, 76: 181-187.
Lab Members
Current Graduate Students
Former Post Docs
Lab Photos
Last edited on: August 11, 2009