https://phys.org/news/2018-07-genes-disease-evolution.html

Animals have unwittingly developed a powerful system to suppress jumping gene activity that uses small, non-coding RNAs called piRNAs, which recognize jumping genes and suppress their activity. Occasionally, jumping genes still manage to move, suggesting that they employ some special tactics to escape piRNA control. However, tracking the mobilization of jumping genes to understand their tactics has been a daunting task.

The Carnegie team developed approaches to track the movements of jumping genes using the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. To facilitate their investigation, they disrupted piRNA suppression to increase the activity of these jumping genes and then monitored the movement of them during the egg-development process. This led to their discovery on the tactic that allows jumping genes to move.