ERC Advanced Grant for Eileen Furlong’s genomic research
Unit Leader Eileen Furlong receives ERC Advanced Grant to further understand genome regulation.
Eileen Furlong. Credit: Kinga Siring/EMBL
Research to lead a transformative ‘leap’ forward in our understanding of genome regulation just got substantial support from the ERC to help scientists move forward.
The European Research Council (ERC) announced funding to EMBL Unit leader Eileen Furlong and her project, ‘Looping Enhancers And Promoters provide Specificity’ (LEAPS), as part of its latest Advanced Grants competition.
“LEAPS is about understanding how our genome is regulated,” Furlong said. “Genes only code for ~3% of our genome. The rest of the genome, which used to be thought of as just junk DNA, contains many control elements (enhancers) which switch genes on and off, regulating when and where genes are expressed. Changes to this regulation are a major driving force of both evolution and disease. Actually, from sequencing millions of humans, we now know that the majority of disease-associated genetic mutations are in this non-coding part of the genome.”
She added that the genome contains hundreds of thousands of these control elements, often located far away from the gene they regulate, so that the DNA must fold (or loop) to bring the enhancer and gene’s promoter together. How they find their correct gene, and in many cases, skip over (or ignore) other genes, are the central questions that LEAPS will address.
LEAPS uses the power of large-scale genetics and genomics in a developmental model, the Drosophila embryo, to understand how this is regulated.
“This financial support is crucial,” Furlong noted. “ERC funds are so important in Europe to fund big, ambitious projects in discovery research. This support will allow us to continue to innovate in this important area. Enhancers were discovered approximately 40 years ago, and we still don’t understand how they work together with other regulatory elements to regulate precise patterns of gene expression.”
The ERC Advanced Grants allow senior researchers like Furlong to pursue ambitious, curiosity-driven projects that lead to major scientific breakthroughs. These grants are part of the EU’s Horizon Europe programme.
