Joseph Martens, Lisa Laprade, and Fred Winston found that by
switching on the new gene, they could stop the neighboring
structural gene from being expressed. "It is the active
transcription of another gene that is regulating the process,"
said Martens, HMS research fellow in genetics and lead author of
the June 3 Nature study . "I cannot think of another regulatory
gene such as this one," said Winston, HMS professor of genetics.
The researchers have evidence that the new gene, SRG1, works by
physically blocking transcription of the adjacent gene, SER3.
They found that transcription of SRG1 prevents the binding of a
critical piece of SER3's transcriptional machinery. The
discovery raises tantalizing questions. How does this gene-
blocking occur? Do other regulatory genes work in this fashion?
Does the same mechanism occur in mammals, including humans? At
the same time, SRG1 provides clues to a recent puzzle.
Researchers have lately begun to suspect that the long stretches
of apparently useless, or junk, DNA mig