2025 Prather Lecture Series: Feng Zhang

Dr. Feng Zhang 
Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Core Member, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard
Investigator, McGovern Institute for Brain Research, MIT
James and Patricia Poitras Professor in Neuroscience, MIT
Departments of Brain and Cognitive Sciences and Biological Engineering, MIT

Programmable Nucleic Acid Recognition

Abstract: To read and write their genomes and transcriptomes, or those of their hosts, organisms rely on systems that can recognize specific nucleic acid patterns. Although some of these systems are hard-coded to recognize a single motif, there are some systems that can be programmed to recognize different sequences. These include modular proteins in which blocks of amino acid repeats are combined to recognize specific sequence motifs and RNA-guided systems in which a single protein (or complexes of proteins) interacts with the target sequence by varying the RNA guide. In this talk, Zhang will discuss the natural diversity of these systems and their development into biotechnologies for modifying and modulating the genome and transcriptome, as well as highlight how they are being used as therapeutics.

Co-sponsored by The Departments of Molecular and Cellular Biology and Organismic and Evolutionary Biology