Anuj Kumar

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During his graduate work, Kumar studied basic mechanisms of gene regulation in the fungus Neurospora crassa, looking at how the organism regulated gene expression in response to varying levels of cellular sulfur. His dissertation characterized a single gene in the sulfur uptake and assimilation pathway of the fungus.

Today, he looks at thousands of genes at once, seeking a "bigger picture" of nature's operation. His model organism is "Baker's yeast" , a single-celled workhorse of cellular biology that shares a remarkable number of features with higher organisms, including humans. "Yeast is actually a really good model of a single human cell," Kumar says. "Obviously, if we can understand the workings of a human cell, then we can better understand how that cell has been compromised in the cancer or disease state."

As in a human cell, genes in yeast rarely act alone. Genes act in complex networks of collaboration and feedback. Only by looking at many genes at once can one begin to see possible patterns that indicate functional networks, Kumar explains. There are roughly 6,000 genes in S. cerevisiae, spelled out in 13 million base-pairs of DNA.

Kumar is taking a high-throughput, large-experiment approach to the study of gene function in yeast. His experiments involve the use of robots for sample preparation, microarray chips, and even custom-designed software for sorting and interpreting very large data sets. By combining these methods, Kumar has so far discovered 137 new genes in yeast, while also collecting functional data for more than 3,000 yeast proteins.

"The hope is that by looking at the big picture, you can see things that wouldn't be apparent at the single gene level," Kumar says. "That's still a hope," he adds with a smile.