Scientists have devised a powerful new tool for understanding how DNA controls gene activity in cells. The tool allows researchers to map at high resolution, across large swaths of a cell’s genome, which DNA nucleotides work to regulate gene activity. “This is the first method that enables us to simultaneously test thousands of human DNA regulatory regions for their ability to turn genes on and off, and to map in high resolution the elements that activate and repress genes within them,” said Jason Ernst, the study’s lead author and an assistant professor of biological chemistry at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.
