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My research
at GSU has been focused
on two areas: tick molecular systematics and molecular vector biology,
including tick and pathogen relations.
My
primary research interests in molecular systematics are to develop and
test phylogenetic utilities of previously unused nuclear protein-encoding genes
in ticks and insects. Comparing with the mitochondrial genes, nuclear protein-encoding genes are under used in phylogenetic
reconstruction.
Investigations into the utility of nuclear protein-encoding
genes for systematic are needed because animal and plant biodiversity is
primarily determined by the nuclear genomes. Mitochondrial and nuclear ribosomal genes
are useful for phylogenetic studies, but we cannot expect to use these
limited number of genes for reconstructing the tree of life for all
organisms at all taxonomic levels. A robust
phylogeny comes from multiple, independent datasets. The nuclear
genomes are potentially rich resources of phylogenetic characters.
The major obstacle in using
of nuclear protein-encoding genes is the PCR
primer definition, because, unlike the mitochondrial and ribosomal
genes, in which the "universal" primers are available, nuclear protein-encoding
genes usually do not share the "universal" primers. With a
grant funded by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH), my laboratory
has been developing a laboratory strategy for utilizing of protein-encoding genes in tick
and insect phylogenetic analyses without building cDNA libraries.
In addition to
tick molecular systematics, my laboratory also involves in the studies
of molecular vector biology and
molecular population genetics of ticks. We are also investigating genes
that are promising in development of anti-tick vaccines.
(See
Fang's publications
and presentations).
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