Higgs Lab Profile

Research Focus: Chromatin Modification and Human Genetic Disease

With completion of the human genome project, understanding how the 26,000 genes are regulated to produce developmental stage and tissue specific expression has emerged as the central question in current biology. In the past, understanding globin gene regulation made major contributions to many of the landmark discoveries that underpin our current understanding of how mammalian genes are normally regulated. The current descriptions of how the globin genes are expressed from their natural chromosomal environments are arguably the most highly developed of all such models in mammalian systems. Nevertheless our picture of globin gene regulation is far from complete and understanding the interplay of chromosome structure, the transcription factor programme and epigenetic modification, as the globin genes are activated and silenced in haemopoiesis, will continue to elucidate the general mechanisms by which mammalian genes are regulated in vivo.