gene regulation
Cool Videos: Know When to Fold Them
Posted on by Dr. Francis Collins
As most of you probably know, the human genome—our genetic instruction book—contains about 3 billion base pairs of DNA. But here’s a less well-known fact: if you would take the DNA from the nucleus of just one human cell and stretch it end-to-end, it would measure about 6 1/2 feet. How can a molecule of that length be packed into a cell nucleus that measures less than .00024 of an inch? Well, this fun video, which accompanies exciting new findings published in the journal Cell, serves to answer that fundamental question.
I’m proud to say that NIH helped to support the highly creative team of researchers that, over the course of the past five years, have mapped with unprecedented detail and precision how the human genome folds inside the cell’s nucleus. Among the many things they’ve learned is that, in much the same way that origami artists can craft a vast array of paper creatures using two simple folds, the genome is able to work its biological magic with just a few basic folds—including the all-important 3D loop
