The National Institutes of Health (NIH) awarded Dr. Leonidas Bleris  $1,098,244 for his research initiative project within the Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences (DMS), titled DMS/NIGMS 2: The Mathematics of Epigenetic Regulation in Human Cells. The purpose of this project is to address a major challenge at the intersection of mathematics and molecular biology developing precise representations of epigenetic mechanisms. Despite the important role epigenetics plays in regulating gene expression, most current mathematical models overlook this critical factor.

Dr. Leonidas Bleris will create a theoretical, computational, and experimental outline to model epigenetic regulatory systems in single human cells. This project will center on accumulating and integrating CRISPR-based epigenetic mechanisms into human cells, allowing the construction of stable biomolecular circuits that will function as a “ground truth” for refining predictive models. This research project will investigate the responsive behavior and strength of these circuits, by focusing on occurrences such as multistability, and oscillations.

Through this project, Dr. Leonidas Bleris also intends to advance our understanding of how epigenetic mechanisms impact gene expression, which could have broad indications in disease treatment and cellular engineering. By combining new theoretical frameworks with experimental justification, this research is expected to contribute to both the fields of synthetic biology and computational biology, offering innovative tools for studying gene regulation.