Welcome to the "GeneLab Chats" series, an opportunity to explore the newest GeneLab-enabled publications by hearing brief interviews with authors. In this issue, GeneLab has the privilege of speaking with Dr. Borja Barbero Barcenilla of Texas A&M University.
Spaceflight-induced changes in astronaut telomeres have garnered significant attention in recent years. While plants represent an essential component of future long-duration space travel, the impacts of spaceflight on plant telomeres and telomerase is largely unexplored. The publication “Arabidopsis telomerase takes off by uncoupling enzyme activity from telomere length maintenance in space" by Dr Borja Barbero, et al, examines Open Science datasets (GLDS-38, GLDS-120, GLDS-218, GLDS-427). This publication found that even though Arabidopsis plants sent to space – and in follow up studies on Earth – show no change in their telomere length, their roots experience a significant boost in telomerase activity, along with increased genome oxidation.
GeneLab recently had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Borja Barbero about his groundbreaking work, highlighting how collaborations and networking facilitated through GeneLab's data systems and Analysis Working Groups (AWGs) played a pivotal role in enabling this publication.
