Nutritional and endocrine control of mosquito egg development.

我的职业目标是获得动物生理学或综合生物学领域的教职，这两个领域都需要在生物学方面进行广泛的培训。病媒管理需要一系列工具在多个层面上研究蚊子，以便我们更深入地了解蚊子在其环境中的功能，从而产生控制病媒昆虫的新方法。我在生物生物学、生态学和生物化学方面的背景将有助于实现这一目标。目前，我的研究开始表征蚊卵发育的分子内分泌学，其初步结果支持这一RSDA应用。我的研究项目需要描述雌性卵子生产的荷尔蒙和营养控制。我未来的研究将试图解释的核心概念是，组织如何将有关营养水平的信息传递给神经系统，然后神经系统协调蚊子卵成熟所需的激素生产。这些关键的调控过程可以作为干扰的目标，作为病媒控制的一种方法。因为血液消化本身是一个复杂的生理过程，所以我使用了一种不需要血餐的自体蚊子--黑斑蚊，因此从我的实验中去掉了血液消化的因素。在朝着我的研究目标前进的过程中，我已经在这种蚊子的卵巢和脂肪体中确定了可能参与生殖调节的几组基因。在这项申请中，我建议通过识别女性大脑中的基因来扩大我对在监测和调节卵子发生方面发挥关键作用的组织的研究。然后，我将描述组织特异性基因，这些基因有望参与蚊子产卵。候选基因和蛋白质将接受定量聚合酶链式反应和免疫分析。参与调节卵子发育的三种多肽荷尔蒙也将在卵子发生过程中被表征，并接受生物检测以证实观察到的变化。通过这些研究，我希望对蚊子的已知基因和新基因进行表征，这些基因编码调节卵子发育所需的产物。冈比亚按蚊和埃及伊蚊的基因组数据库是可用的，这为我挖掘信息以识别参与这些相同过程的基因提供了信息。对这些基因的鉴定和鉴定将扩大我们对蚊子媒介中的噬血和病原体传播的理解。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): My career goal is to obtain a faculty position in the field of animal physiology or integrative biology, both fields of which require broad training in biology. Vector management requires an array of tools to study mosquitoes at multiple levels, so that we gain a deeper understanding of how mosquitoes function in their environment, leading to novel ways of controlling insect vectors of disease. My background in organismal biology, ecology, and biochemistry will help reach this goal. Currently, my research is beginning to characterize the molecular endocrinology of mosquito egg development, preliminary results of which support this RSDA application. My research program entails characterizing the hormonal and nutritional control of female egg production. The central concept that my future studies will seek to explain is how tissues convey information about nutrient levels to the nervous system that then coordinates hormone production for egg maturation in mosquitoes. These key regulatory processes can serve as targets for disruption as an approach for vector control. Because blood digestion itself is a complex physiological process, I use a species of "autogenous" mosquito, Ochlerotatus atropalpus, which does not require a blood meal, thus removing the factor of blood digestion from my experiments. In progress toward my reseach goals, I have identified sets of genes in ovaries and fat body of this mosquito that may be involved in the regulation of reproduction. In this application, I propose to extend my examination of tissues that play a key role in monitoring and regulating oogenesis by identifying genes in female brains. I will then characterize tissue-specific genes expected to be involved in mosquito egg production. Candidate genes and proteins will be subjected to quantitative PCR and immunoassays. Three peptide hormones involved in regulating egg development will also be characterized over the course of oogenesis and subjected to bioassays to substantiate the observed changes. From these studies, I expect to characterize sets of known and new genes in mosquitoes that encode products required to regulate egg development. Genomic databases are available for the vectors Anopheles gambiae and Aedes aegypti, giving me information to mine for the identification of genes involved in these same processes. Identification and characterization of these genes should expand our understanding of hematophagy and pathogen transmission in mosquito vectors.