In a landmark effort to understand how the physical structure of our DNA influences human biology, Northwestern investigators and the 4D Nucleome Project have unveiled the most detailed maps to date of the genome’s three‑dimensional organization across time and space, according to a new study published in Nature.

The findings, generated using human embryonic stem cells and fibroblasts, offer a sweeping view of how genes interact, fold and reposition themselves as cells function and divide, said co-corresponding author Feng Yue, the Duane and Susan Burnham Professor of Molecular Medicine in the department of biochemistry and molecular genetics.

“Understanding how the genome folds and reorganizes in three dimensions is essential to understanding how cells function,” said Yue, who also is director of the Center for Advanced Molecular Analysis and founding director of the Center for Cancer Genomics at the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University. “These maps give us an unprecedented view of how genome structure helps regulate gene activity in space and time.”