Genome architecture's surprising role in cell fate decisions

A new study shows unexpected and crucial role of genome architecture in determining cell fate. The work represents an important advance in our understanding of gene regulation and reveals a new layer of complexity that needs to be studied to properly interpret genomics and gene expression in the future. An example of how risky fundamental science with innovative approaches leads to surprising and important advances in knowledge. Scientists have long been reading the code of life -- the genome -, as a sequence of letters but now researchers have also started exploring its three-dimensional organisation. In a paper published in Nature Genetics, an interdisciplinary research team of scientists from the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) -- including a Centro Nacional de Análisis Genómico (CNAG-CRG) group -- in Barcelona, Spain, shows that the three-dimensional organisation of the genome plays a key role in gene expression and consequently in determining cell fate.