E. Peter Geiduschek
Research  Professor, UCSD

e-mail: epg@biomail.ucsd.edu


     The central theme of current research is the enzymology of gene regulation, specifically of transcriptional regulation. Our focus is on fundamental mechanisms, approached from a molecular genetic and biochemical perspective. It is now widely appreciated that the transcriptional apparatus of all cells (archaeal, bacterial and eukaryotic) has common evolutionary roots. It follows that transcription-regulatory mechanisms should also share certain broadly similar mechanistic features. In that spirit, we work in parallel with bacteria and their viruses, with eukaryotes, and with archaea.

Areas of recent, current and planned research:

     1) the constitution, structure and functions of transcription initiation complexes (transcriptional initiation is an important, although not the exclusive, control point of gene regulation)
     2) comparison of the structures of transcription initiation complexes formed by archaeal and eukaryotic RNA polymerases
     3) regulation of transcription in archaea
     4) transcriptional activation by topologically (as opposed to physically) bound proteins.

    Nechaev, S., Kamali-Moghaddam, M., André, E., Léonetti, J.-P. and Geiduschek, E.P.  (2004). The T4 late transcription co-activator, gp33, binds the flap domain of Escherichia coli RNA polymerase. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., 101:17365-17370.

    Ouhammouch, M., Langham, G.E., Hausner, W., Simpson, A.J., El-Sayed, N.M.A. and Geiduschek, E.P. (2005). Promoter architecture and response to a positive regulator of archaeal transcription. Mol. Microbiol., 56:625-637.

    Kassavetis, G.A., Soragni, E., Driscoll, R. and Geiduschek, E.P. (2005). Reconfiguring the connectivity of a multiprotein complex: Fusions of yeast TBP with Brf1, and the function of TFIIIB. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 102:15406-15411.

    Nechaev, S. and E.P. Geiduschek  (2006). The role of an upstream promoter interaction in initiation of bacterial transcription. EMBO J., 25:1700-1709.

    Kassavetis, G. A., Driscoll, R. and Geiduschek, E.P. (2006).  Mapping the principal interaction site of the Brf1 and Bdp1 subunits of S. cerevisiae TFIIIB. J. Biol. Chem., 281:14321-14329.

    Juo, Z.S., Kassavetis, G.A., Wang, J., Geiduschek, E.P. and Sigler, P.B. (2003). Crystal structure of a TFIIIB core interface ternary complex. Nature, 422:534-539.

 E. Peter Geiduschek received his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship and has served on the editorial boards of several scientific journals. Dr. Geiduschek is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and is also a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Academy of Microbiology.