Dr. Rashid Minhas

Rendall Centre of Cell and Molecular Biophysics
New Hunt’s House
University of Exter, UK

Short Bio: Dr. Rashid Minhas is currently working as postdoc fellow at Rendall Centre of Cell and Molecular Biophysics. He is energetic and highly focused biomedical scientist with 6 years of postdoctoral working experience in world class research centers and UK academic institution. He has Published his research stories in the area of genomics, gene regulation and developmental biology in peer reviewed journals.

Keynote Topic: Deciphering the cis-regulatory catalogue of zebrafish endodermal genes.

Regulation of gene expression in the early endoderm, the germ layer that will form the gastrointestinal tract, respiratory tract, and associated organs, involves combinatorial transcriptional and signalling inputs into the cis-regulatory modules (CRMs) of a conserved network of genes, including mixl1. In zebrafish, Mixl1, a homeodomain transcription factor, regulates endoderm specification in response to Nodal signalling and is itself a mediator of Nodal signalling. mixl1 is expressed transiently in the embryo at the margin of the blastula and early gastrula.  However, how this expression is regulated at the cis-regulatory level is unknown. As an initial attempt to elucidate CRMs of mixl1, we identified a 627 bp genomic interval upstream of the mixl1 transcription start site using unbiased Circularized Chromosome Conformation Capture followed by Sequencing (4C-Seq) and Chromatin Immunoprecipitation Sequencing (Chip-Seq) data. This region drives reporter expression in the margin and correlates with endogenous mixl1 expression in early zebrafish embryos. Moreover, the deletion of the identified enhancer by CRISPR/Cas9 caused a reduction of mixl1 expression in the margin, suggesting this CRM is sufficient and necessary for early mixl1 expression. Elucidation of such mixl1-associated CRMs will offer insight into the transcriptional and signaling inputs that drive endodermal transcriptional regulation.