"Toward predictive biology of evolution"

Date & Time: 2025. Mar.13 (Thu) 15:00-
Language: English/Japanese

Naoki Konno

University of Tokyo, Graduate School of Science, Graduate School Student

Evolutionary biologists have developed research frameworks to estimate the past evolution by studying extant species. Building on this understanding of the past, how can we predict the future evolution of life? Throughout my Ph.D., I have addressed this question by developing bioinformatics methods and exploring novel patterns of repeated evolution. In this seminar, I will first introduce Evodictor, a machine learning tool that predicts gene gain and loss events, and demonstrate that Evodictor can extract patterns from bacterial evolution to forecast evolutionary changes in nature. I will then present my latest research on the convergent evolution of 3D protein structures, illuminating how to identify new types of evolutionary patterns. Finally, I will discuss how our understanding of "evolvability" can be updated by data-driven predictive approaches.
(Host: Prof. Naoki Irie)

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