Research activities in my laboratory focus on identifying and characterizing the interactions among components in several such signal transduction systems. The goal of our current efforts is to identify the signaling circuitry that regulates Skn7. This yeast project is a collaboration with the Bussey Laboratory at McGill University. The bacterial chemotaxis system and yeast SKN7 system are just two examples of the many sensory-response systems that have evolved to enable microorganism to cope with environmental changes.
Related systems operate in all cells, mammalian as well as microbial.
An emerging theme in the general area of signal transduction is that many evolutionarily distinct organisms utilize similar signaling mechanisms, but with interesting modifications. Kinetic characterization of phosphotransfer between CheA and CheY in the bacterial chemotaxis system. Biochemistry 36, 2030-2040. Page, N., Sheraton, J.L., Brown, J.L., Stewart, R.C., and Bussey, H. 1996. Identification of ASK10 as a multicopy activator of Skn7p-dependent transcription of a HIS3 reporter gene.