Plant and animal cells contain two genomes: one in the nucleus and one in the mitochondria. When mutations occur in each, they can become incompatible, leading to disease. Graduate student, Marissa Holmbeck is an author on the paper that hopes to increase the understanding of such illnesses. She worked on a team with scientists at Brown University and Indiana University to trace one example in fruit flies down to the individual errant nucleotides and the mechanism by which the flies become sick. Read more in David Orenstein's article about when cell's genomes collede.
February 5, 2013