 Berryman
will receive a two-year $221,250 NIH award in June for
his grant proposal, “Role of CLIC in epithelial
morphogenesis. “He is the principal investigator, along
with co-principal investigator Soichi Tanda, Ph.D.,
associate professor of biological sciences.
CLIC proteins are traditionally thought to transport
chloride ions across cell membranes—hence the term CLIC,
an acronym for “chloride intracellular channels.”
But according to Berryman, CLIC proteins may do a lot
more than that. Recent studies indicate that they help
regulate development and maintenance of tissues—and may
be involved in the development of cancer cells.
In 2000, Berryman discovered one type of CLIC protein,
CLIC 5, while conducting research on the human placenta.
More recently, researchers in Maine and Oregon
discovered that mice without CLIC 5 lost their hearing
during early development. “It turns out that sensory
epithelial (surface) cells in the mouse ear degenerate
without CLIC 5,” Berryman says. “We wanted to find
similar patterns, to broaden our perspective on what
CLICs do.”
To better understand the link between CLIC proteins and
cell development, Berryman is studying how CLIC proteins
interact with other proteins in fruit flies. Fruit flies
make good research subjects, he said, because their
protein structure and their genetic coding sequence are
similar to those of humans.
More importantly, fruit flies only exhibit one type of
CLIC gene, whereas many organisms—like mice or
humans—have several different CLIC genes. That’s
important because, to test the functions of CLIC,
Berryman must inhibit the CLIC gene in the fruit fly,
and if more than one CLIC gene exists, the others take
over, thus complicating the research.
Berryman and Tanda will be working with a team of
undergraduate, graduate and medical students to expand
understanding of CLIC function and basic biology.
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