Zhenglong Gu
Prof Asst
2007
HENutrSci

Web Bio Page

Current Activities

Current Professional Activities
Cornell University Graduate Field Membership: Nutrition, Computational Biology
Provisional member for Genetic & Development


Current Research Activities
Evolutionary genomics; Whole genome duplication and evolution of fermentation in yeast; Regulation of duplicate genes with redundant functions; Evolution of antagonistic pleiotropy.

Biography

Biographical Statement
Dr. Zhenglong Gu received his Bachelors of Science degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Peking University in 1998, and his PhD degree in Ecology and Evolution in 2003 from University of Chicago. He conducted his postdoctoral research at Stanford Genome and Technology Center from 2004 to 2006. He became an Assistant Professor in the Division of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell University in 2006.

Dr. Gu’s laboratory uses a combination of computational and experimental approaches to understand the structure of metabolic networks and how these have been shaped over evolutionary time by selective pressures, such as those imposed by nutrient constraints. Much of the effort is devoted to understanding these issues in Saccharomyces cerevisiae, because of its simplicity, rapid growth and the availability of robust experimental and computational tools. Specific interests include the relationship between whole genome duplication and the evolution of new phenotype in eukaryotic organisms, duplicate gene regulation and evolution of antagonistic pleiotropy. His laboratory also has interests in using computational approach to address the relationship between nutrition and human evolution.



Education
  • PhD 2003 - University of Chicago, Ecology & Evolution
  • BS 1998 - Peking University, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology


    • Administrative Responsibilities
    Division Safety Committee 2006-
    Field seminar committee 2007-2010

    Courses, Websites, Pubs

    Courses Taught
    NS275 Human Biology and Evolution (with Dr. Jere Haas) Fall 2007
    NS660 Nutrition and Human Evolution, Spring 2008
    NS605 Nutritional Biochemistry Colloquium, Spring 2007 - current

    Related Websites
    DNS website
    http://nutrition.cornell.edu/

    Publications
    Functional relaxation of mitochondria after whole genome duplication in yeast. Jiang, H, Guan, W., Pinney, D., Wang, W., Gu, Z. in revision for Genome Research

    Wu, W, McCusker, J.H. …Gu, Z ... Genome sequencing and comparative analysis of Saccharomyces cerevisiae strain YJM789. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA. 104:12825-12830
    (2007)

    Jiang, H, Liu, D, Gu, Z, Wang, W. Rapid evolution in a pair of recent duplicate segments of rice. Exp Zoolog B Mol Dev Evol, 308B, 50-57 (2006)

    Gu Z, David L, Petrov D, Jones T, Davis RW, Steinmetz LM. Elevated evolutionary rates in the lab strain of S. cerevisiae. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, USA 2005;102:1092-1097.

    Maltsev N, Glass EM, Ovchinnikova G, Gu Z. Molecular mechanisms involved in robustness of yeast central metabolism against null mutations. J Biochem (Tokyo) 2005;137(2):177-187.

    Gu Z, Rifkin SA, White KP, Li W-H. Duplicate genes increase expression diversity within and between species. Nature Genetics 2004;36:577-579.

    Li W-H, Gu Z, Cavalcanti A, Nekrutenko A. Detection of gene duplications and block duplications in eukaryotic genomes. Journal of Structural and Functional Genomics 2003;3:27-34.

    Gu Z, Steinmetz LM, Gu X, Scharfe C, Davis RW, Li W-H. Role of duplicate genes in genetic robustness against null mutations. Nature 2003;421:63-66.

    Cavalcanti A, Ferreira R, Gu Z, Li W-H. Patterns of gene duplication in yeast and C. elegans. Journal of Molecular Evolution 2003;56:28-37.

    Gu Z, Nicolae D, Lu H-S, Li W-H. Rapid divergence in expression between duplicate genes inferred from microarray gene expression data. Trends in Genetics 2002;18:609-613.

    Li, W.-H., Gu, Z., Wang, H., Nekrutenko, A. Evolutionary Analyses of the Human Genome. Nature, 409, 847-849 (2001)

    Gu Z, Wang H, Nekrutenko A, Li W-H. Densities, length proportions, and other distributional features of repetitive sequences in the human genome estimated from 430 megabases of genomic sequence. Gene 2000;259:81-88.

    Hao L, Gu Z, Dai Z. The frequency distribution and establishment of fruit fly strain of segregation distorter in drosophila melanogaster in China. Acta Genetica Sinica 2000;4:298-303.