US-Switzerland Planning Visit: Gene Expression and Genetic Manipulation of House Fly Sex Determination

该项目将启动理查德·梅塞尔在休斯顿大学的研究小组与瑞士和荷兰的同事之间的新合作。Meisel和他的同事们将研究雄性和雌性家蝇如何从相同的基因中发展出不同的特征。特别是，研究将集中在基因表达-从基因中产生RNA和蛋白质-在男性和女性之间有何不同。家蝇非常适合这一系列的实验，因为启动雄性和雌性性状产生的发育机制的特点，基因组测序，遗传实验的资源是可用的。梅塞尔小组的研究人员将前往丹尼尔波普在瑞士苏黎世的实验室学习家蝇基因操作技术。他们还将与欧洲合作者合作设计实验，揭示雄性和雌性发育途径中的突变如何影响整个家蝇基因组的基因表达。这些实验将解决有关发育途径结构的基本问题，并为害虫的遗传控制策略提供信息。一名研究生将参加规划访问，来自科学领域代表性不足的群体的本科生将被招募来协助实验。PI将进一步使用本研究中的例子，在休斯顿学校的中学科学教师的培训练习与大量的风险学生population.Developmental网络通常由保守的中心节点，从进化动态上游监管机构接收输入。据推测，中央节点是保守的，因为它们的扰动有有害的表型效应，而上游监管机构是进化不稳定的，部分原因是因为这些变化的途径是强大的。性别决定（SD）是检验这一假设的理想模型，因为SD网络具有预测的进化保守模式，并且SD基因及其产生的性别特异性表型是众所周知的。这项新的合作将允许RNAi和转基因方法用于操纵家蝇SD途径的实验。生物表型，包括基因表达，将被测量，以测试是否扰动保守的节点有更激烈的表型的后果比在其上游调节器的变化。

This project will initiate a new collaboration between Richard Meisel's research group at the University of Houston and colleagues in Switzerland and the Netherlands. Meisel and his colleagues will study how male and female house flies develop distinct sets of traits from the same genes. In particular, the research will focus on how gene expression - the production of RNA and protein from genes - differs between males and females. The house fly is well suited for this line of experimentation because the developmental mechanisms that initiate the production of male and female traits are characterized, the genome is sequenced, and resources for genetic experimentation are available. Researchers in the Meisel group will travel to Daniel Bopp's laboratory in Zurich, Switzerland to learn techniques for the genetic manipulation of houseflies. They will also work with European collaborators to design experiments that uncover how mutations in the male and female developmental pathways affect the expression of genes throughout the house fly genome. These experiments will address fundamental questions about the structure of developmental pathways and inform genetic control strategies for insect pests. A graduate student will participate in the planning visit, and undergraduates from under-represented groups in the sciences will be recruited to assist with the experiments. The PI will further use examples from this research in training exercises for middle school science teachers in Houston schools with large at-risk student populations.Developmental networks often consist of conserved central nodes that receive input from evolutionarily dynamic upstream regulators. It is hypothesized that the central nodes are conserved because perturbations to them have deleterious phenotypic effects, whereas the upstream regulators are evolutionarily labile in part because the pathways are robust to these changes. Sex determination (SD) is an ideal model for testing this hypothesis because SD networks have the predicted pattern of evolutionary conservation, and SD genes and the sex-specific phenotypes they produce are well known. This new collaboration will allow for experiments in which RNAi and transgenic approaches are used to manipulate the house fly SD pathway. Organismal phenotypes, including gene expression, will be measured to test whether perturbations to conserved nodes have more drastic phenotypic consequences than changes in their upstream regulators.