Etown professor researches the Human Genome

Jonathan Coren, assistant biology professor, is amid conducting research on the human genome project. Receiving a grant from the National Institutes of Health to aid him in his research, as well as assistance from the College’s students, Coren is in the process of creating functional genome libraries.

Started in 1990 by the U.S. Department of Energy and the National Institutes of Health, some of the project’s goals are to identify all the approximate 30,000 genes in human DNA, determine the sequences of the three billion chemical base pairs that make up human DNA, store this information in databases and improve tools for data analysis.

Coren is hoping his research will lead to identifying specific genes of interest and create the technology necessary for future human genetic study. These libraries are essentially a collection of human DNA that are used to make the DNA maps and are used as a template for DNA sequencing.

"I am building a functional human genomic library that will serve as a valuable resource for the Human Genome community," said Coren. "This collection of human DNA fragments makes up the library.  Because the vector that each member off the library resides in has special properties, people can investigate their favorite gene in human tissue culture cells," explained Coren.

According to Coren, his library "will allow investigators to search for new disease genes, study gene regulation and alternative gene spicing, as well as other things."

"Many genes can make more than one protein product by deciding which portions of the gene to include, and I have also built into this vector the ability to generate nested deletions from both ends of a given genomic insert," he said.

Coren admited, "This allows an investigator to find both boundaries of a gene, which could save someone time and money before sequencing the DNA to identify their gene of interest."

"Most of my research interests are in developing new technologies to aid others in basic research," said Coren. "Down the road, I also plan to use this technology to investigate my favorite gene of interest once I figure that out."

Previously a professor at a regional campus of South Western Oklahoma University, it is Coren’s first semester at the College. "One of the things I like about Etown is the admissions standards," said Coren. "There is more range of abilities within the student body," he admitted.

Despite this being Coren’s first semester, he has taken up many of the duties that most tenured professors of the College are involved in. "Right now I am juggling a lot of different things; mentor in the classroom, advisor and researcher," said Coren, "but I love teaching, especially the interaction with students. It keeps me on my toes."   

What Coren hopes for in his students is "continuity." He wants to be able to train students who will work independently, and who will then eventually train other students. "I am looking for students who are committed and want to do this [research], so there will be continuity down the road," said Coren. "I want to maximize their [students] potential and get them excited." This fits into what Coren terms as a "life lesson," which he learned early on in his career. "Find your passion; do what you love."

One of the students working with Coren is junior Amit Prasad. Prasad spent eight weeks of his summer interning at the University of Maryland Greenebaum Cancer Center, where he worked in a lab. Wanting to continue this during the academic year, Prasad approached biology professor Frank Polonaowski, who suggested he speak to Coren. Coren agreed and Prasad began research with him immediately.

"In the first couple of months we were doing digests and running the fragments on gels. In recent weeks we have taken digested fragments and electroporated them into cells," said Prasad.

Coren’s goals of this research are to enlarge the "human genome library that I already created and at the same time improve the technology so that investigators can now make deletions from both ends of any DNA of interest found in my library." 

Coren admits that he could be conducting this research in any academic setting. "If I were at a large university, I would have better equipment and a bigger research budget," said Coren. "I would also have graduate students and postdocs and some undergraduates doing the research."