NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2013

这个博士后研究奖学金授予博士亚历克斯R。货车大坝得到了生物科学理事会和国家科学基金会国际科学与工程办公室的支持。在为期24个月的研究期间，货车大坝博士将从事一个名为“昆虫宿主植物泛化的新见解：紫球藻属物种的群体转录组测序”的项目。“在Uffe H.丹麦技术大学系统生物学系的Mortensen博士说，世界上许多农作物都受到寄生性吸汁昆虫的侵袭，例如。蚜虫和介壳虫，导致作物损失并威胁粮食安全。 在这些昆虫中，它们可以攻击的植物数量有很大的差异。该项目旨在通过比较通才（以许多不同植物物种为食的昆虫）与专家（仅以少数或单一植物物种为食的昆虫）中发现的基因，来描述负责不同规模昆虫对宿主植物偏好的基因。除了确定蚧虫对寄主植物偏好的基因外，该项目还旨在了解寄主植物偏好基因如何在种群中保持，以及这是否会影响它们可以食用的植物物种的数量。具体而言，该项目旨在测试大种群是否能够比小种群更好地保持导致更大寄主植物宽度的基因。本研究的一个实际应用是在入侵杂草的生物防治和农业害虫的控制。这将有助于实现更广泛的社会目标，如减少农药使用和可持续农业。支持这项研究将导致发现，这将有助于更有利可图的农业产业。此外，还将开发实用的生物信息学教程，这些教程是面向研究生和本科生的开放获取和基于网络的资源。生物信息学的开放获取教程将有利于本科生和研究生的职业发展。 该奖项为美国科学家提供了与外国科学家合作的独特机会，并利用国外独特的设施，专业知识和实验条件。

This Postdoctoral Research Fellowship award to Dr. Alex R. Van Dam is supported by both the Directorate for Biological Sciences and the Office of International Science and Engineering at the National Science Foundation. During the 24-month fellowship, Dr. Van Dam will work on a project titled, "New insights into insect host-plant generalization: population transcriptome sequencing of Porphyrophora spp." under the sponsorship of Dr. Uffe H. Mortensen at the Department of Systems Biology, Technical University of Denmark.Many of the worlds' crops are attacked by parasitic sap sucking insects, eg. aphids and scale insects, which lead to crop losses and threaten food security. Among these insects, there is a wide variation in the number of plants they can attack. This project aims to describe genes responsible for different scale insects' host plant preferences by comparing the genes found in generalists (insects that feed on many different plant species) to specialists (insects that feed on only a few or single plant species). Besides identifying genes responsible for host plant preference in scale insects, this project also aims to understand how host plant preference genes are maintained across populations, and if this has an affect on the number of plant species they can feed on. Specifically the project aims to test if large populations are able to better maintain genes that lead to greater host plant breadth than small populations. A practical application of this research is utility in biological control of invasive weeds, and control of agricultural pests. This will help in broader societal goals such as reduction of pesticide use and sustainable farming. Support of this research will lead to discoveries that will make for a more profitable agriculture industry. Additionally practical bioinformatics tutorials will be developed that are open-access and web-based resources aimed at graduate students and undergraduates. Open-access tutorials on bioinformatics will benefit undergraduate and graduate student career development. This award provides a unique opportunity for a US scientist to collaborate with foreign scientists, and utilize the unique facilities, expertise and experimental conditions available abroad.