10 thoughts on “C14 – Watts

  1. Was DNA damage induced into DNA within cells or outside of the cells? If it was the latter, how did you isolate the specific gene product from the cell?

    1. All DNA is localized within the cell, so the DNA damage takes place inside. The mRNA was extracted through a process of cell lysis, centrifugation, and filtration which removes the RNA from the cell.

  2. In your future directions you discussed investigating the gene further because you concluded that UbiconE2 is not likely apart of the DNA repair process, what experiments could you conduct that would conclude what role it is apart of?

  3. You mentioned you would continue searching for the role that UbiconE2 plays in the conjugation of this organism, do you have a prediction for what that role may be?

    1. Since we already know the gene encodes for a ubiquitin-related enzyme, we can reasonably predict that it could play a role in degrading protein products during conjugation, some of which could actually be involved more directly in the DNA damage repair pathway.

  4. Do you have any predictions about what the gene may code for if the results did not show a role in the DNA damage pathway?

  5. You mentioned that Rad51 shows that DNA damage is induced but UbiconE2 gene expression decreases (not involved in repair pathway)…what experiments can you preform in order to figure out it’s role. I know you briefly touched upon this, just curious if you have any educated regarding its role? Great presentation!

    1. Since we already know this genes encodes a protein that conjugates to ubiquitin, I would guess that it plays a role in degrading proteins during conjugation. In terms of actual experiments, I would take another look at its gene expression profile and see if it resembles those of any other genes known to be involved in different processes in conjugation, much like we did with Rad 51 in this research project.

  6. Are there any genes besides Rad51 you compared UbiconE2 to that made you choose it for this experiment?

    1. Yes, the gene expression profile seen in Rad51 — the increase, decrease, increase, decrease or double peak pattern — is characteristic for several genes that are known to be involved, such as in the gene hop3.

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