Global Health Colloquium
February 17,2010
Global Health Colloquium
Wednesday, February 17
4:00 – 5:00 PM
Galvin Life Science, Room 283
Three students will present their research this week
Dongyoung Shin - from Korea, got her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in the Department Agricultural Biology, Korea University. She studied about genetic differences in Trialeurodes varporariorum population occurred in vegetable greenhouses in her Master’s program. She entered the Department of Biological science in University of Notre Dame 2005 spring semester, in Dr. David Severson’s infectious disease laboratory.
Title: Pathway Analysis of the Meiotic Drive System in Aedes aegypti
Abstract
Meiotic drive in Aedes aegypti has potential as a mechanism for driving trangenes for pathogen resistance into natural Ae. aegypti populations. The endogenous meiotic drive system, found in some Ae. aegypti populations, causes the female determining chromosome to fragment during spermatogenesis. Mating between a drive male and a drive sensitive female results in highly male biased sex ratios. The molecular basis for the drive mechanism is presently unknown.
We conducted a whole transcripts analysis of testes from a meiotic drive carrying strain in comparison with a drive sensitive strain using microarrays based on the complete annotated Ae. aegypti gene set. We hypothesized that genes putatively involved in the meiotic drive system would show up-regulation in T37. Transcripts statistically significant for the meiotic drive system were mapped to pathways by gene functions and constructed gene networks. Immune response pathways were highly ranked in this study.
The network in this study showed a relation with Ras super-family signaling pathway in immune response. This study would also be useful for investigating the mechanism of the meiotic drive system. The candidate genes for the meiotic drive genes will be map to the chromosome and verify the gene function by RNAi.
____________________________________________________________
Kyanne Reidenbach received a B.S. in Entomology from Purdue University in December of 2006. She did undergraduate research under the direction of Dr. Catherine Hill where she assisted in the characterization of Aedes aegypti GPCRs. She joined the Besansky lab in March of 2007 and is an Arthur J. Schmitt Fellow. Her research covers many aspects of mosquito evolution, from broad scale phylogenetic relationships at the family level to incipient speciation within Anopheles gambiae.
Title: Behavioral responses of Anopheles gambiae M and S larvae to chemical stimuli
Abstract
Characterization of the M and S molecular forms of Anopheles gambiae has primarily been at the molecular level. Unfortunately, few quantitative investigations at the phenotypic level have been carried out, hindering our ability to link genotypic variation to phenotype. Previously, colony reared larvae were shown to elicit attractive or repulsive behavioral responses to several chemical stimuli. We investigated two of these chemicals for behavioral differences in M and S larvae captured from around Yaoundé, Cameroon. We found an unexpected difference in the strength of the phototactic responses between the forms. However, more investigation is needed before these differences can be confirmed.
____________________________________________________________
Nathan Konopinski - began working as a web developer for VectorBase in 2007 and since has taken over administration responsibilities of the web site. He was accepted into Notre Dame's Graduate School in 2009 where he continues to develop the VectorBase project and pursue a Master of Science in Biology under the direction of Dr. Frank Collins. Nathan is from South Bend, Indiana and received his Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering with a Minor in Music from Purdue University in 2006.
Title: BLAST@VectorBase.org: advancing the user experience
Abstract
VectorBase's most popular section went five years without any changes. During that time advances in web technologies were made to allow for a more enjoyable and efficient user experience on the internet. Specifically, the tools of JavaScript, AJAX, and CSS were used to streamline the user interface. Additionally, the distributed computing program XGrid was added for increased stability of BLAST job processing.
Wednesday, February 17
4:00 – 5:00 PM
Galvin Life Science, Room 283
Three students will present their research this week
Dongyoung Shin - from Korea, got her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in the Department Agricultural Biology, Korea University. She studied about genetic differences in Trialeurodes varporariorum population occurred in vegetable greenhouses in her Master’s program. She entered the Department of Biological science in University of Notre Dame 2005 spring semester, in Dr. David Severson’s infectious disease laboratory.
Title: Pathway Analysis of the Meiotic Drive System in Aedes aegypti
Abstract
Meiotic drive in Aedes aegypti has potential as a mechanism for driving trangenes for pathogen resistance into natural Ae. aegypti populations. The endogenous meiotic drive system, found in some Ae. aegypti populations, causes the female determining chromosome to fragment during spermatogenesis. Mating between a drive male and a drive sensitive female results in highly male biased sex ratios. The molecular basis for the drive mechanism is presently unknown.
We conducted a whole transcripts analysis of testes from a meiotic drive carrying strain in comparison with a drive sensitive strain using microarrays based on the complete annotated Ae. aegypti gene set. We hypothesized that genes putatively involved in the meiotic drive system would show up-regulation in T37. Transcripts statistically significant for the meiotic drive system were mapped to pathways by gene functions and constructed gene networks. Immune response pathways were highly ranked in this study.
The network in this study showed a relation with Ras super-family signaling pathway in immune response. This study would also be useful for investigating the mechanism of the meiotic drive system. The candidate genes for the meiotic drive genes will be map to the chromosome and verify the gene function by RNAi.
____________________________________________________________
Kyanne Reidenbach received a B.S. in Entomology from Purdue University in December of 2006. She did undergraduate research under the direction of Dr. Catherine Hill where she assisted in the characterization of Aedes aegypti GPCRs. She joined the Besansky lab in March of 2007 and is an Arthur J. Schmitt Fellow. Her research covers many aspects of mosquito evolution, from broad scale phylogenetic relationships at the family level to incipient speciation within Anopheles gambiae.
Title: Behavioral responses of Anopheles gambiae M and S larvae to chemical stimuli
Abstract
Characterization of the M and S molecular forms of Anopheles gambiae has primarily been at the molecular level. Unfortunately, few quantitative investigations at the phenotypic level have been carried out, hindering our ability to link genotypic variation to phenotype. Previously, colony reared larvae were shown to elicit attractive or repulsive behavioral responses to several chemical stimuli. We investigated two of these chemicals for behavioral differences in M and S larvae captured from around Yaoundé, Cameroon. We found an unexpected difference in the strength of the phototactic responses between the forms. However, more investigation is needed before these differences can be confirmed.
____________________________________________________________
Nathan Konopinski - began working as a web developer for VectorBase in 2007 and since has taken over administration responsibilities of the web site. He was accepted into Notre Dame's Graduate School in 2009 where he continues to develop the VectorBase project and pursue a Master of Science in Biology under the direction of Dr. Frank Collins. Nathan is from South Bend, Indiana and received his Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering with a Minor in Music from Purdue University in 2006.
Title: BLAST@VectorBase.org: advancing the user experience
Abstract
VectorBase's most popular section went five years without any changes. During that time advances in web technologies were made to allow for a more enjoyable and efficient user experience on the internet. Specifically, the tools of JavaScript, AJAX, and CSS were used to streamline the user interface. Additionally, the distributed computing program XGrid was added for increased stability of BLAST job processing.