Life Sciences Café: Jennifer Hackney Price

Jennifer Hackney Price

Join us for a Life Sciences Café seminar, "Exploring developmental checkpoints in fruit flies," presented by Jennifer Hackney Price, assistant professor in Arizona State University's School of Mathematical and Natural Sciences.

Children with chronic inflammatory disorders often present with delayed puberty. Can we use fruit flies as a model to understand how damaged tissues influence developmental timing?

Abstract: 
During development, checkpoints allow organisms to interpret internal and external environmental cues to ensure survival and reproductive fitness. Under sub-optimal conditions (e.g. high population density, poor nutritional content, illness, etc.) organisms will not continue to the next developmental stage, and will only move forward when conditions improve. In the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster, localized tissue damage in larvae will prevent progression to metamorphosis until the damaged tissue has been repaired. These developmental arrests activate a wide array of signaling pathways, ultimately resulting in reduced production of ecdysone, the steroid hormone that induces molting and metamorphosis in arthropods. Our research seeks to understand the mechanisms underlying developmental checkpoints that lead to delayed metamorphosis in Drosophila larvae. We find that damage inflicted through a variety of methods and to both larval and imaginal (adult precursor) tissues can activate the developmental checkpoint. We have also identified 61 genes with a potential role in meditating this checkpoint. Ultimately, we hope to apply these findings to better understand developmental checkpoints in other animals, including humans.

Meet the presenter after the seminar and enjoy coffee and dessert.

This seminar is part of the Life Sciences Café seminar series.

View the livestream at asunow.asu.edu/asulive.

Heather Bean
School of Life Sciences
heather.d.bean@asu.edu
http://sols.asu.edu
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Life Sciences C, Room 202