Jeremy Prokop, a senior scientist in the Jacob Lab, performed evolutionary analysis of genome methylation from sponges to humans for a study published online January 17 in Nature’s open access journal Scientific Reports.
The collaborative paper concludes that, contrary to the popular view that genome methylation doesn’t occur in invertebrates, the sponge possesses the mechanisms to regulate methylation.
Aside from Prokop, the study’s contributors include 13 researchers from the Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Va., the University of Richmond and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Corresponding author David Williams, PhD, presented at HudsonAlpha Research Seminars in November 2016.
