May 22-23, 2009:

Misook Ha doctoral convocation was held on May 23, proceeded by Vikram Agarwal undergraduate convocation on May 22. Misook will work on computational and statistical analysis of gene expression and chromatin data in polyploids. Vikram graduated with several prestigious awards, including a predoctoral fellowship award from the NSF. He will attend the graduate school at MIT in Fall 2009. Congratulations!

January 27, 2009:

Misook Ha published a first-author paper, entitled "Duplicate genes increase expression diversity in closely related species and allopolyploids" in the Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences of the USA (PNAS). Congratulations!

January 15, 2009:

Dr. Zhongfu Ni, a former postdoctoral fellow and visiting scientist from China Agricultural University, Beijing, and Eun-Deok Kim, a current Ph.D. student in Plant Biology, were co-first authors of a recent discovery in the Chen Laboratory that reveals how plants grow bigger and more vigorously through changes in their internal clocks. The work, entitled "Altered circadian rhythms regulate growth vigour in hybrids and allopolyploids", was published in 15 January 2009 issue of Nature. Nature highlighted the work in the subtitle of the cover (Hybrid Vigour - Plants seize the day) and featured the research in the Authors page Abstractions and in the Podcast (Big Plants). Nature Review Genetics featured the Research Highlight "Plant Development: Growing with Time". BBC World Service aired a segment on 5-7 December 2008.

December 19, 2008:

The third-floor lunch party attracted over 40 students, postdocs, and staff members from the Chen lab, Pierce-Shimomura lab, Sullivan lab, Trent lab, and Whiteley lab, all housed in the third floor of the Neural and Molecular Sciences (NMS) Building.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

December 4, 2008:

Misook Ha graduated in December 2009 with a Ph.D. in Cellular and Molecular Biology (Bioinformatics and Computational Biology track). She will work as a postdoctoral fellow in Computational Biology on elucidating the mechanisms for expression evolution in Arabidopsis.

November 21, 2008:

The annual Cotton Fiber Genomics project meeting was held in Austin. The project was funded by the National Science Foundation and focused on "Genetic and Functional Genomic Analysis of Early Events in Cotton Fiber Development". The attendees of the meeting include:
PI: Chen Lab (David Pang, Yuki Guan, Misook Ha, Vikram Agarwal, UT-Austin)
Co-PI: Triplett Lab (He Jim Kim, Doug Hinchliffe, USDA-ARS/UNO)
Co-PI: David Stelly (Shivapriya Manchali, Texas A&M)
Co-PI: Peggy Thaxton (Mississippi State University)
Co-PI: Sing-Hoi Sze (Texas A&M)
Collaborator: Candace Haigler (North Carolina State University)
Collaborator: Brian Scheffler (USDA ARS MSA Genomics Laboratory, Stoneville, MS)
Collaborator: Pablo Rabinowicz (Institute for Genome Sciences, University of Maryland)
Industry Representative: Don Jones (Cotton Incorporated)