Welcome To Black Lab.

The Black Lab is answering the most pressing questions in chromosome biology, such as:

  • How does genetic inheritance actually work?
  • How was epigenetic information transmitted to us from our parents?
  • Can building new artificial chromosomes help us understand how natural chromosomes work?
  • How are the key enzymes protecting the integrity of our genome specifically and potently activated by potential catastrophes like DNA breaks or chromosome misattachment to the mitotic spindle?

News

Runi’s paper reports how centromeric chromatin is maintained long-term, independent of new assembly during the extended prophase I arrest in mouse oocytes

Craig posts his report of a new system for generating human artificial chromosomes that efficiently form and also avoid the rampant multimerization of input DNA that plagued all prior versions

Nikaela posts her peer reviewed study establishing hydrogen/deuterium exchange-mass spectrometry as a robust approach to determine the structural underpinnings for phase separation of a mitotic regulatory complex

Nootan, Craig, and Jennine post their report of a mouse species harboring a single chromosome with an evolutionarily recent 6 Mbp expansion of a new repeat that increases centromere protein recruitment during cell division

Scientific Community

We are very active in scientific interactions across several departments, programs, and schools here at UPenn, including close-knit ties to graduate programs in Biochemistry and Molecular Biophysics (BMB) and Cell and Molecular Biology (CAMB). We are also founding members of the Penn Center for Genome Integrity and multi-lab group meetings of the Philly Chromosome Club.