Thomas Charles Kaufman is an American

geneticist A geneticist is a biologist or physician who studies genetics, the science of genes, heredity, and variation of organisms. A geneticist can be employed as a scientist or a lecturer. Geneticists may perform general research on genetic processe ...

. He is known for his work on the zeste-white region of the ''Drosophila''

X chromosome The X chromosome is one of the two sex-determining chromosomes (allosomes) in many organisms, including mammals (the other is the Y chromosome), and is found in both males and females. It is a part of the XY sex-determination system and XO sex-d ...

. He is currently a Distinguished Professor of biology at

Indiana University Indiana University (IU) is a system of public universities in the U.S. state of Indiana. Campuses Indiana University has two core campuses, five regional campuses, and two regional centers under the administration of IUPUI. *Indiana Universit ...

, where he conducts his current research on

Homeotic Genes In evolutionary developmental biology, homeotic genes are genes which regulate the development of anatomical structures in various organisms such as echinoderms, insects, mammals, and plants. Homeotic genes often encode transcription factors, transc ...

in evolution and development.

Early life and education

Kaufman enrolled in California State University at Northridge in 1962. There he joined the laboratory of George Lefevre. This inspired Kaufman to pursue a career in genetics and to use the ''Drosophila'' as his model system of choice. Kaufman attained his Ph.D from the University of Texas in 1970. While there he did his graduate work with Burke Judd. His work focused on

saturation mutagenesis Site saturation mutagenesis (SSM), or simply site saturation, is a random mutagenesis technique used in protein engineering, in which a single codon or set of codons is substituted with all possible amino acids at the position. There are many v ...

as well as the developmental genetics of the Zeste- White region of the Drosophila X Chromosome. This research became a classic study in genetics. The purpose was to test the “one gene – one chromosome” hypothesis. Their results helped to estimate the size of the Drosophila genome long before gene sequencing was a thing. Kaufman went on to join David Suzuki’s group at the

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public university, public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks a ...

. He served as a postdoctoral associate, and their research involved temperature sensitive

mutation In biology, a mutation is an alteration in the nucleic acid sequence of the genome of an organism, virus, or extrachromosomal DNA. Viral genomes contain either DNA or RNA. Mutations result from errors during DNA or viral replication, mi ...

Research and career

After one year of research with David Suzuki, Kaufman became an individual researcher in

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

. During this time, Kaufman began his collaboration with Rob Denell that focused on a set of mutations that caused dominant defects in the fly’s head and anterior

thorax The thorax or chest is a part of the anatomy of humans, mammals, and other tetrapod animals located between the neck and the abdomen. In insects, crustaceans, and the extinct trilobites, the thorax is one of the three main divisions of the cre ...

. In 1983, Kaufman became an associate professor at Indiana University, where he remains. It was during this time that Kaufman defined the

antennapedia ''Antennapedia'' (abbreviated ''Antp'') is a Hox gene first discovered in ''Drosophila'' which controls the formation of insect leg, legs during development. Loss-of-function mutations in the regulatory region of this gene result in the devel ...

gene complex. He discovered that this cluster of genes controlled the anterior segments in the embryo and adults. Kaufman broadened his work to examine the

HOX gene Hox genes, a subset of homeobox genes, are a group of related genes that specify regions of the body plan of an embryo along the head-tail axis of animals. Hox proteins encode and specify the characteristics of 'position', ensuring that the cor ...

(homeotic gene clusters) in insects. Kaufman went on to found and design

FlyBase FlyBase is an online bioinformatics database and the primary repository of genetic and molecular data for the insect family Drosophilidae. For the most extensively studied species and model organism, ''Drosophila melanogaster'', a wide range of ...

, which is a database that organizes data on the Drosophila. Kaufman also helped to establish the Bloomington Drosophila Stick Center and the Drosophila Genomics Resource Center. Kaufman's current research still heavily involves the HOX gene. He is currently interested in proteome changes in the head of the aging Drosophila. In his personal statement for the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

he states that "The goal of my laboratory is to contribute to an understanding of the genetic regulation development of higher organisms. The homeotic (Hox) genes of Drosophila melanogaster have been our principal focus. Homeotic lesions cause one portion of the animal to be transformed into an identity normally found elsewhere. The role of the Hox genes is best viewed as a set of developmental switches for decisions of segmental fate. The encoded homeodomain has shown that this switch activity is carried out through the

transcriptional regulation In molecular biology and genetics, transcriptional regulation is the means by which a cell regulates the conversion of DNA to RNA (transcription), thereby orchestrating gene activity. A single gene can be regulated in a range of ways, from alt ...

of target genes." He has expanded his research from ''Drosophila'' to include several other insects and members of other

subphylum In zoological nomenclature, a subphylum is a taxonomic rank below the rank of phylum. The taxonomic rank of "subdivision (rank), subdivision" in fungi and plant taxonomy is equivalent to "subphylum" in zoological taxonomy. Some plant taxonomists ...

s under the phylum Arthopoda, such as

Crustacea Crustaceans (Crustacea, ) form a large, diverse arthropod taxon which includes such animals as decapods, seed shrimp, branchiopods, fish lice, krill, remipedes, isopods, barnacles, copepods, amphipods and mantis shrimp. The crustacean gro ...

Chelicerata The subphylum Chelicerata (from New Latin, , ) constitutes one of the major subdivisions of the phylum Arthropoda. It contains the sea spiders, horseshoe crabs, and arachnids (including Opiliones, harvestmen, scorpions, spiders, Solifugae, solif ...

and

Myriapoda Myriapods () are the members of subphylum Myriapoda, containing arthropods such as millipedes and centipedes. The group contains about 13,000 species, all of them terrestrial. The fossil record of myriapods reaches back into the late Silurian, a ...

. He uses the technique of RNA-mediated gene inhibition (

RNAi RNA interference (RNAi) is a biological process in which RNA molecules are involved in sequence-specific suppression of gene expression by double-stranded RNA, through translational or transcriptional repression. Historically, RNAi was known by o ...

) to study the evolution of the HOX gene.

Awards and honors

* 2010- , Chairman, National Drosophila Board * 2008, Member, National Academy of Science * 2007, Member, American Association for the Advancement of Science * 2005, George W. Beadle Medal * 1999, Member, Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences * 1998, Conklin Medalist * 1993, Distinguished Professor of Biology at Indiana University * Member, Genetics Society of America * Member, Drosophila Genome Project

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kaufman, Thomas Year of birth missing (living people) Living people California State University, Northridge alumni University of Texas alumni University of British Columbia alumni Indiana University faculty 21st-century American biologists American geneticists 21st-century American educators Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences