Gene Networks Studied Through Analysis Of Mutant Worm Movements

The idea that worms can be seen as waveforms allowed scientists at Rice University to find new links in gene networks that control movement. The work led by Rice biochemist Weiwei Zhong, which appears online this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early Edition, involved analyzing video records of the movement of thousands of mutant worms of the species Caenorhabditis elegans to identify the neuronal pathways that drive locomotion. One result was the discovery of 87 genes that, when inactivated, caused movement defects in worms... via Health News from Medical News Today Read More Here..