During biological and medical research, scientists attempt to investigate "when, where, and what kind of changes or evolution occur in complex multicellular systems," but many unresolved problems remain. For example, even when budding yeast undergoes evolution in the laboratory, it is difficult to directly observe which mutations are acquired and become dominant in the environment.
One method to solve this problem is "retrospective clone isolation." Each cell in the target population is pre-labeled with a marker (DNA barcode), then proliferated and divided into two groups. When cell clones with specific DNA barcodes are observed to exhibit interesting behavior in one group, cells with the same DNA barcode can be retrieved from the pre-state of the other group and examined, making it possible to analyze cells with specific destinies as if going back in time. The research team led by Specially Appointed Professor Nozomu Yachie at the University of Osaka has now developed a "clone selection method" that significantly improves this methodology. The excellent aspect of this method is that it applies genome editing to make only cells with specific DNA barcodes fluoresce, enabling highly precise separation of target cells.
This enables examination of cell behavior over long periods of time, such as how cancer cells behave in response to anticancer drug administration. It is also expected to contribute to a wide range of fields including stem cell biology, regenerative medicine, and evolutionary biology.
(Article: Masanori Nakajo)
