Mutant of the Month

Credit: N.H.P.A./ANTPhoto.com

The cardiac lethal (c) mutant of the axolotl Ambystoma mexicanum is February's MoM. The axolotl (which means 'water-dog' in the Aztec language Nahuatl) is a large salamander native to Lake Xochimilco in Mexico. It typically features dark skin with green mottling and occasional silver patches. The first laboratory axolotls were brought to Paris in the 1860s to be raised in the Jardin des Plantes, and their descendants emerged as an important genetic and developmental model for studying regeneration in the twentieth century. The c mutant is a recessive lethal, first reported in the early 1970s, in which the heart develops but fails to contract owing to the absence of organized sarcomeric myofibrils (the mutant has a characteristic red spot on the flank). The mutant garnered renewed attention in the 1980s when Larry Lemanski and colleagues showed that RNA extracted from normal early embryonic anterior endoderm promoted myofibril organization and contractility of the heart. Although its mechanism of action remains a mystery, subsequent molecular analysis has shown that this 'heart organizer' activity resides in an untranslated RNA, called MIR (myofibrillogenesis inducing RNA), which is expressed in the gastrula and neurula stage heart. Mutant hearts express a version of MIR with a point mutation that may alter its secondary structure. AP

Exceptional individuals wanted

In response to recommendations from researchers, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) created a small number of awards to support individuals with exceptional promise to undertake research projects with a high potential payoff and a higher than usual risk of failure. Nine of these Director's Pioneer Awards were made in 2004. The program is available again this year, and self-nominations can be submitted from 1 March 2005 through 1 April 2005 (http://nihroadmap.nih.gov/pioneer/). According to an analysis carried out last year by the Chronicle of Higher Education (http://chronicle.com/free/v50/i22/22a01701.htm), the average NIH award rose in value by 24% and the number of awards by 34% between 1998 and 2002. In the same period, the number of first-time grantholders increased by just 7%. In the 2002 cohort, the latest for which NIH has made data generally available, 1,519 new investigators received their first grants. So, the selection pressure on those competing for the first rung of the academic ladder remained intense. If this is still the case when the 2004 numbers are available, it will be interesting to see whether there is a case for taking a bigger risk at the bottom of the pyramid. MA

Thom Kaufman

The Genetics Society of America (GSA) has named Indiana University geneticist Thom Kaufman as the recipient of its 2005 George W. Beadle Award. Some of Kaufman's most widely admired work has been his characterization of the zeste-white and Antennapedia regions of the fruit fly genome, which has been exemplary in its use of genetic approaches to answer fundamental questions in development and evolution. A pioneer in the field of evolutionary developmental biology, he and Rudolf Raff coauthored a book on the subject, titled Embryos, Genes and Evolution: The Developmental Genetic Basis of Evolutionary Change (Indiana University Press, 1991). The GSA's Beadle Award honors Kaufman most of all for his community-minded work in helping to establish FlyBase and the Bloomington Drosophila Stock Center and Drosophila Genomic Resource Center. Previous recipients include Norbert Perrimon, Gerald Rubin, Allan Spradling, Andre Goffeau, Robert Mortimer, Gerald Fink, John Sulston, Robert Waterston and Michael Ashburner. AP

Touching Base written by Myles Axton and Alan Packer.