Research in the lab focuses on how a single genome gives rise to a variety of cell types and body parts during development. We use Drosophila as a model organism to investigate (1) how transcription factors access DNA to regulate complex patterns of gene expression, and (2) how post-translational modification of histones contributes to maintenance of gene expression programs over time. We combine genomic approaches (e.g. chromatin immunoprecipitation followed by high-throughput sequencing) with Drosophila genetics and transgenesis to address both of these questions. Defects in cell fate specification and maintenance of cell identity often occur in human diseases, including cancer. (website)

Curriculum vitae

My research interests focus on the structure-function study of enzymes in the vitamin K cycle. This cycle participates in post-translational modification of proteins involved in a broad range of biological functions including blood coagulation, bone homeostasis, signal transduction, and other cell control systems. γ-Glutamyl carboxylase (GGCX) and vitamin K epoxide reductase (VKOR) are the two enzymes currently known in this cycle. Both enzymes are integral polytopic proteins localized in the endoplasmic reticulum. The identity of vitamin K reductase (VKR), one of the key enzymes in the vitamin K cycle, is still unknown. Through biochemical, molecular and cellular approaches, I seek to investigate how these enzymes function in their native milieu and how natural mutations in these enzymes lead to distinct genetic disorders. My present study focuses on the identification of VKR using the novel genome editing tool CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats)-Cas (CRISPR-associated protein) system.

Recent Publications

I am a plant systematist, plant community ecologist, biogeographer, and conservation biologist focused on the species and systems of the Southeastern United States.  Students in my lab focus on the systematics and biogeography of the Southeastern United States, community classification developing the U.S. National Vegetation Classification, and land management, conservation planning, and environmental policy questions involving the conservation of Southeastern United States ecosystems and species. Prior to coming to UNC in 2002, I had an extensive career in applied conservation biology, working with the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program, The Nature Conservancy, and NatureServe (the Association for Biodiversity Information).  My conservation interests and activities continue, with my service as Trustee of the N.C. Natural Heritage Trust Fund (http://www.ncnhtf.org/) from 2008-2013 (which has provided $328 million through 518 grants to support the conservation of more than 298,000 acres of natural areas in North Carolina), Chair of the N.C. Plant Conservation Program’s Scientific Advisory Committee (http://www.ncagr.gov/plantindustry/plant/plantconserve/index.htm), and Chair of the N.C. Natural Heritage Program Advisory Committee (http://www.ncnhp.org/). I am the author of Flora of the Southern & Mid-Atlantic States (http://www.herbarium.unc.edu/flora.htm), a taxonomic manual covering about 7000 vascular plant taxa, now the standard in use across much of the Southeastern United States.  With J. Chris Ludwig and Johnny Townsend, I am co-author of the Flora of Virginia (http://www.floraofvirginia.org/), published in 2012 and awarded the Thomas Jefferson Award for Conservation, and am also an active author, editor, reviewer, and director of the Flora of North America project (http://fna.huh.harvard.edu/).  I was a co-founder of the Carolina Vegetation Survey (http://cvs.bio.unc.edu/), and continue as one of its four organizers.

In the Hurlbert Lab we ask questions about the structure of ecological communities, and the processes that are responsible for determining the patterns of diversity, composition, turnover and relative abundance both within local assemblages and across the globe. Our work spans vertebrate, invertebrate, and plant communities, and we use a variety of approaches from manipulative experiments to modeling to working with global scale datasets. Current projects in the lab use

• large-scale citizen science datasets to quantify phenological mismatch between birds and caterpillars,
• simulation models to test hypotheses for the latitudinal diversity gradient, and
• eco-evolutionary experiments with Drosophila (with the Matute lab) to test ideas of thermal niche, competition, and niche conservatism.

“Ecological patterns, about which we construct theories, are only interesting if they are repeated. They may be repeated in space or in time, and they may be repeated from species to species. A pattern which has all of these kinds of repetition is of special interest because of its generality, and yet these very general events are only seen by ecologists with rather blurred vision. The very sharp-sighted always find discrepancies and are able to say that there is no generality, only a spectrum of special cases. This diversity of outlook has proved useful in every science, but it is nowhere more marked than in ecology.”

–Robert MacArthur, 1968

Education:

MS, Biology, The University of North Carolina at Greensboro (1993)
BS, Animal Science, University of Massachusetts at Amherst (1987)

Fall 2021 Office Hours:

Email Barbara Stegenga for an appointment or drop by Coker 211.

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