About 5-15% of all cases of Parkinson's disease have a known genetic cause. It is thought that the vast majority of cases are caused by genetic risk factors and environmental factors such as pesticide exposure. We are testing the role stress response genes in protecting against pesticide induced Parkinson's disease.
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Figure above shows dopaminergic neurons in the adult Drosophila brain in red. When a person loses about 80% of these neurons, the classical motor symptoms of Parkinson’s disease usually become present. Similar locomotor problems also occur in fly models of Parkinson’s disease.
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In collaboration with Drs. Charlie Thompson, Scott Sakaluk, Pirmin Nietlisbach, and Nate Mortimer, we are working on understanding how oxidative stress impacts house wren health and physiology. Some species of birds, including house wrens, can lay eggs with varying pigment patterns from lightly pigmented eggs to darkly pigmented eggs. The pigment protoporphyrin found in house wren eggs is associated with oxidative stress, and it has been debated if the degree of pigmentation in the egg is an indicator of the oxidative state and subsequent health of the female. We found that females that lay lighter colored eggs have larger offspring and are older, suggesting that lighter eggs indicate a female with less oxidative stress and better health (Hodges et al 2020). We also found that egg shell pigmentation is a prediction of the protoporphyrin content, a strong pro-oxidant (Thompson et al 2022).
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The picture above is of the house wren Troglodytes aedon. Image was taken by Paulo E. Llambias.
The figure above by Kara Hodges shows House wren (Troglodytes aedon) eggs from different nests produced on the study area in 2017 (Hodges et al 2020).
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