Cell Biology Commons^™

Examining Transcriptional Regulators During Muscle Development In Drosophila Melanogaster, Chaamy Yapa

Student Theses and Dissertations

In Drosophila melanogaster embryos, a distinct approach to study the transcriptional regulation is to examine the larval somatic muscle development. Transcription factors are essential regulatory proteins that help to control gene expression and respond to signaling pathways and various cues. Today, there are at least twenty transcription factors that have been discovered to contribute to the development of the 30 distinct larval somatic muscles in each abdominal hemisegment of Drosophila melanogaster. Several studies have already been conducted on muscle regulatory transcription factors including midline and apterous. These transcription factors were shown to control the development of muscles through mutant …

A Neuromuscular Look Into Genetics Of Muscle Aging, Christina Talley

Master of Science in Integrative Biology Theses

As individuals age throughout their life, they experience muscle tissue loss that impacts their quality of life such as a decrease in their physical capabilities and sometimes even their mental capacity. The process of muscle aging is the key point of this study. This involves the individual’s muscles and the motor neurons that control them. Skeletal muscles are used daily to maintain posture, stand, walk, etc. Throughout a lifetime these muscles undergo damage and need to be repaired. When the muscles are repaired, they express physical changes. The tissue shrinks in size and eventually the composition of the tissue is …

Real-Time Quantitative Pcr To Demonstrate Gene Expression In An Undergraduate Lab, Abijeet Singh Mehta, Amit Singh

Biology Faculty Publications

The objective of this teaching note is to develop a laboratory exercise, which allows students to get a hands-on experience of a molecular biology technique to analyze gene expression. The short duration of the biology laboratory for an undergraduate curriculum is the biggest challenge with the development of new labs. An important part of cell biology or molecular biology undergraduate curriculum is to study gene expression. There are many labs to study gene expression in qualitative manner. The commonly used reporter gene expression studies are primarily qualitative. However, there is no hands-on experience exercise to quantitatively determine gene expression. Therefore, …

An Undergraduate Cell Biology Lab: Western Blotting To Detect Proteins From Drosophila Eye, Neha Gogia, Ankita Sarkar, Amit Singh

Biology Faculty Publications

We have developed an undergraduate laboratory to allow detection and localization of proteins in the compound eye of Drosophila melanogaster, a.k.a fruit fly. This lab was a part of the undergraduate curriculum of the cell biology laboratory course aimed to demonstrate the use of Western Blotting technique to study protein localization in the adult eye of Drosophila. Western blotting, a two-day laboratory exercise, can be used to detect the presence of proteins of interests from total protein isolated from a tissue. The first day involves isolation of proteins from the tissue and SDS-PAGE (sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide) gel …

Physiology And Genetics Of Starvation-Selected Drosophila Melanogaster, Christopher Michael Hardy

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

In nature, organisms have evolved to survive in stressful environments. This has driven organisms to adopt a wide range of unique adaptations. Investigating the mechanistic basis of these adaptations is an important tool for discovery that has led to major advances in science and medicine.

We study how organisms survive life without food, or starvational stress. Environmental stressors have shaped the quantity and quality of food sources across the globe. This has led to vast differences in the ability of some organisms to tolerate starvation over others. Many researchers have used Drosophila melanogaster as a model to study global patterns …

Regulation Of Synaptogenesis By The Mirna Pathway And Fmr/P Bodies, Jacqueline Rochelle Furlong

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Post-transcriptional regulation of mRNA is facilitated by different mechanisms, such as microRNA (miRNA) induced gene silencing or fragile X mental retardation protein (FMRP) mediated repression either independent of or acting through cytoplasmic RNA Processing bodies (P bodies). DPTP99A, Lar, and Wg have known functions during synaptogenesis and may be targets of miR-8. Here, we provide evidence that miR-8 regulates DPTP99A in vitro. Non-endogenous miR-8 expressed using an UAS driver regulates Lar. Endogenous miR-8 may regulate DPTP99A in vivo. Here we show that FMRP is capable of colocalizing with the P body components: DCP1, HPat, and Me31B, but not …

Regulation Of Meiotic Cohesion And Chromosome Core Morphogenesis During Pachytene In Drosophila Oocytes, Radhika S. Khetani, Sharon E. Bickel

Dartmouth Scholarship

During meiosis, cohesion between sister chromatids is required for normal levels of homologous recombination, maintenance of chiasmata and accurate chromosome segregation during both divisions. In Drosophila, null mutations in the ord gene abolish meiotic cohesion, although how ORD protein promotes cohesion has remained elusive. We show that SMC subunits of the cohesin complex colocalize with ORD at centromeres of ovarian germ-line cells. In addition, cohesin SMCs and ORD are visible along the length of meiotic chromosomes during pachytene and remain associated with chromosome cores following DNase I digestion. In flies lacking ORD activity, cohesin SMCs fail to accumulate at oocyte …