Short Bio

My name is Lara Ballester Torres. I’m from Ponce, Puerto Rico. I graduated from the University of Puerto Rico Ponce Campus. I have a bachelor’s degree in natural sciences with a major in Biomedicine. I am currently working on the JARM lab with my mentor José A. Rodríguez Martínez. There, I have been acquiring computational skills to perform experimental data analysis, specifically for DNA affinity purification sequencing (DAP-seq) technique.  My future plans changed when I entered the RaMP-UP program, it made me more interested in bioinformatics. I am currently looking for more information about bioinformatics and their application in different areas such as pharmaceutical industry or in genetics. In the future, I want to keep studying and training in this area to contribute to the science community and be more involved in scientific communication.

A fun fact or hobby: My hobbies are reading and listening to music.

Research

Mentor:

José A. Rodríguez Martínez , PhD

Co-mentor: 

Josué Perez Santiago , PhD

Project Title: 

Determining SIX transcription factors and genomic binding sites using a DNA-affinity purification approach

Project Description: 

Transcription factors (TFs) are DNA-binding proteins that recognize cis-regulatory elements to either promote or repress gene expression. TFs are studied using antibody-dependent assays such as CHIP-seq, however, these assays prove to be challenging in non-model organisms due to antibody unavailability. Using a DNA purification-based assay we can overcome these limitations. DNA affinity purification sequencing (DAP-seq) is a high-throughput in vitro technique which provides detailed, high-resolution genome wide transcription factor binding sites (TFBS) and identifies a high number of TF-DNA interactions. In brief, DAP-seq works by using a recombinant protein and genomic DNA, which will be incubated together, and TF-bound DNA will be eluted and sequenced for analysis. We applied DAP-seq to study SIX TF binding specificities in Drosophila melanogaster (D. melanogaster), focusing on optix. Understanding these TF-DNA interactions is essential for studying the role of TFs in gene expression and with DAP-seq we could also study non-model organisms.