Project description:<p>Spit for Science™ is a university-wide research opportunity with the scientific goal of understanding how genetic and environmental factors come together to influence substance use and emotional health across the college years and beyond. To address this goal, we have comprehensively and longitudinally studied eligible incoming freshmen (18 years or older) from a diverse urban university, assessing a wide range of risk and protective factors, including both biological susceptibility and environmental risk, and a variety of outcome measures, particularly alcohol use and other substances, and difficulties with emotional health. Our goal is to assess how risk and protective factors dynamically interact to contribute to behavior health outcomes over time and plan to use findings from the project to inform prevention and intervention efforts and aid in university policy and programming in ways that can support and promote student success.</p> <p><u>Methods</u>: In the fall of their freshman year, first-time college students over the age of 18 are invited to complete an online survey containing broad questions about personality and behavior, as well as family, friends, and experiences growing up. Students can also provide a saliva sample and participate in the DNA component of the project (participation in the DNA component is not a requirement for participation in the survey). Each subsequent spring students are asked to complete a follow-up survey, enabling researchers to study patterns of substance use and emotional health across the college years.</p>
Project description:The human genome is pervasively transcribed into protein-coding and regulatory non-coding RNAs whose functions are coordinated within higher-order nuclear architectures. However, direct mapping of RNA–RNA and DNA–DNA interaction networks in complex human tissues at single-cell resolution has remained a major challenge. Here, we present SCIENCE-seq, a multimodal single-cell interactomics platform enabling simultaneous detection of RNA–RNA interactions and chromatin DNA–DNA contacts within individual cells. Applied to primary glioma specimens, SCIENCE-seq reveals cancer-specific interactions organized by lncRNAs and centered on key oncogenic drivers, including EGFR, hTERT, SOX2, CDK6, CDC42, CD47, and HOX loci. These datasets uncover previously unrecognized molecular relationships between premature lncRNAs and pre-mRNAs that regulate transcription, alternative splicing, and polyadenylation. Notably, we identify a glioma-specific trans-chromosomal HOX hub driven by five interacting lncRNAs. Targeting these RNA and DNA interactions with steric antisense oligonucleotides (ASOs) or CRISPRi enables selective inhibition of oncogenic programs in malignant cells while sparing normal tissue, establishing chromatin interactomes as actionable therapeutic targets.
Project description:The human genome is pervasively transcribed into protein-coding and regulatory non-coding RNAs whose functions are coordinated within higher-order nuclear architectures. However, direct mapping of RNA–RNA and DNA–DNA interaction networks in complex human tissues at single-cell resolution has remained a major challenge. Here, we present SCIENCE-seq, a multimodal single-cell interactomics platform enabling simultaneous detection of RNA–RNA interactions and chromatin DNA–DNA contacts within individual cells. Applied to primary glioma specimens, SCIENCE-seq reveals cancer-specific interactions organized by lncRNAs and centered on key oncogenic drivers, including EGFR, hTERT, SOX2, CDK6, CDC42, CD47, and HOX loci. These datasets uncover previously unrecognized molecular relationships between premature lncRNAs and pre-mRNAs that regulate transcription, alternative splicing, and polyadenylation. Notably, we identify a glioma-specific trans-chromosomal HOX hub driven by five interacting lncRNAs. Targeting these RNA and DNA interactions with steric antisense oligonucleotides (ASOs) or CRISPRi enables selective inhibition of oncogenic programs in malignant cells while sparing normal tissue, establishing chromatin interactomes as actionable therapeutic targets.