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July
23, 2002
Energy
Department Awards $103 Million for Post-Genomic
Research
WASHINGTON, DC -- Secretary of Energy Spencer
Abraham today announced five major research awards
for post-genomic research. The awards total $103
million over the next five years. Research will
be conducted at six national laboratories, 16
universities and research hospitals and four private
research institutes.
The awards are part of the department's new "Genomes
to Life" program that plans to take advantage
of solutions that nature has already devised to
help solve problems in energy production, environmental
cleanup and carbon cycling. Through a systems
approach to biology at the interface of the biological,
physical and computational sciences, the program
seeks to understand entire living organisms and
their interactions with the environment.
The awards were made before DOE employees in the
Forrestal Auditorium this afternoon.
"This innovative research program offers
biotechnology solutions that can help us produce
clean energy, clean up the environment and make
a significant contribution to the President's
policy on climate change," Secretary Abraham
said. "One could hardly imagine when the
Energy Department began the human genome project
in the '80s that the resulting information and
technologies could yield such diverse benefits."
Secretary Abraham made the remarks at an event
at Department of Energy headquarters where he
presented the lead researchers with ceremonial
checks to begin their work.
As part of this initiative, the department's Office
of Science requested proposals for large, multi-institutional
and multi-disciplinary projects involving both
the biological and computational sciences.Scientists
have long tried to understand the workings of
individual genes or small groups of genes. The
new projects will focus on entire networks of
genes and even entire biological systems - single-celled
organisms at first and later more complex creatures
including humans.
This new research is possible because of the information
and technology now available to scientists on
the human genome and the rapidly growing list
of other organisms -- from microbes to plants
to worms to mice -- that provide new perspectives
on the inner workings of biological systems.
The project's 10-year goal is to make advances
in systems biology, computation and technology
that will: contribute to increased sources of
biological-based energy; help understand the earth's
carbon cycle and design ways to enhance carbon
capture; and lead to cost-effective ways to clean
up the environment.
Nature has created an array of molecular machines
with precise and efficient functions and controls,
including motion, molecular detection, chemical
synthesis and degradation, and light emission
and detection. A goal of the Genomes to Life program
is to understand these molecular machines and
their controls so well that they can be used and
even redesigned to address national needs. The
program is also expected to lead to an understanding
of the complex regulatory networks that control
the assembly and coordinate the operation of these
machines.
The program will also provide an understanding
of the complex workings of microbial communities.
Many of the microbes that may be used to help
solve energy and environmental challenges normally
do their work as part of communities made up of
many different microbes. Eight microbes will be
studied in these research projects because of
their potential for: bioremediation of metals
and radionuclides, degradation of organic pollutants,
production of hydrogen or sequestration of carbon
or because of their importance in ocean carbon
cycling. All of these individual microbes have
had their genetic sequence determined under the
department's Microbial Genome program.
None of this is achievable without sophisticated
new computational tools. Thus, to help these achieve
insights, researchers will develop computational
tools to predict the functions and behaviors of
complex biological systems.
More information on the Genomes to Life program
is available at: http://DOEGenomesToLife.org.
FISCAL YEAR 2002 GENOMES TO LIFE RESEARCH AWARDS
Award to Oak Ridge National Laboratory $23.4 million
over 3 years
Genomes to Life Center for Molecular and Cellular
Systems: A Research Program for Identification
and Characterization of Protein Complexes
Research Partners: Pacific Northwest National
Laboratory; Argonne National Laboratory; Sandia
National Laboratory; University of North Carolina
at Chapel Hill; University of Utah.
This team, led by Oak Ridge and Pacific Northwest
National Laboratories, will develop and use the
technologies needed to identify and characterize
the complete set of multiprotein complexes, the
molecular machines of life, within a microbial
cell. The research will focus on two microbes
-- one that plays a significant role in earth's
carbon cycle and another with an ability to clean
up metals in contaminated soil.
Award to Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
$36.6 million over 5 years
Rapid Deduction of Stress Response Pathways in
Metal/Radionuclide Reducing Bacteria
Research Partners: Sandia National Laboratory;
Oak Ridge National Laboratory; University of California
at Berkeley; University of Missouri, Columbia;
University of Washington, Seattle; Diversa Corporation,
San Diego, Calif.
This team will develop computational models to
describe and predict the behavior of gene regulatory
networks in microbes in response to the environmental
conditions found in waste sites contaminated with
metals and radionuclides.
Award to Sandia National Laboratory $19.1 million
over 3 years Carbon Sequestration in Synechococcus:
From Molecular Machines to Hierarchical Modeling
Research Partners: Oak Ridge National Laboratory;
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; Los Alamos
National Laboratory; National Center for Genome
Resources, Santa Fe, NM; University of California
at San Diego; University of Tennessee at Knoxville;
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; The Molecular
Science Institute, Berkeley, CA; University of
California at Santa Barbara; University of Illinois,
Champaign.This team will develop and apply experimental
and computational methods to understand proteins,
protein-protein interactions and the gene regulatory
networks that control the production of these
proteins in a marine microbe that plays a significant
role in earth's carbon cycle.
Cooperative Agreement with the University of Massachusetts,
Amherst $8.9 million over 3 years
Analysis of the Genetic Potential and Gene Expression
of Microbial Communities Involved in the in situ
Bioremediation of Uranium and Harvesting Electrical
Energy from Organic Matter
Research Partners:The Institute for Genomic Research,
Rockville, MD; Argonne National Laboratory; University
of Tennessee, Memphis.
This team will study a family of microbes with
the potential for uranium bioremediation and,
remarkably, for production of electricity through
their ability to transfer electrons to electrodes.
The research's goal is to develop computational
models that can predict the activity of communities
of these microbes in their natural environment.
This knowledge in turn can predict the success
of bioremediation and energy production under
different environmental conditions.
Cooperative Agreement with Harvard Medical School
$15 million over 5 years
Microbial Ecology, Proteogenomics and Computational
Optima
Research Partners: Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, Cambridge, MA; Brigham and Women's
Hospital, Boston, MA; Massachusetts General Hospital,
Boston, MA
This team will study two different microbes --
one that plays a significant role in earth's carbon
cycle, and another with broad metabolic diversity.
The team will study the proteins and protein-protein
interactions in these microbes, the gene regulatory
networks that control the production of these
proteins and the behavior of these microbes as
complex environmental communities. They will develop
computational methods to understand the biology
of these microbes at a systems level.
Media Contact:
Number: PR-02-148
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