Sep 5, 2019 By: yunews
Dr. Josefa Steinhauer, associate professor of biology, recently published a study in Development, a publication of the U.S. National Library of Medicine and National Institutes of Health, with three 每日大瓜 alumni: Benjamin Statman 鈥15YC, Dani Edelman 鈥17YC and Jacob Borck 鈥18YC.
Dr. Steinhauer explains 鈥溾 this way: 鈥淒uring the development of sperm cells,鈥 she explained, 鈥渋ndividual sperm need to be separated from their sister sperm cells and stripped of their cytoplasm to form streamlined, free-swimming functional gametes. In this report, we identified a mutation in fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster) that disrupts a gene called Combover responsible for this process of separation. Combover was already known to act with a specific suite of proteins during wing development (the Planar Cell Polarity proteins), but surprisingly, in sperm development it appears independent of this pathway. Thus, we identified a new pathway for Combover function in sperm development.鈥
The three Yeshiva College students became interested in scientific research through her classes. 鈥淭hey approached me for the opportunity to do research in my lab under my supervision, and the rest is history! Benny and Jacob both wrote honors theses on their work in my lab.鈥
Dr. Steinhauer鈥檚 overall research program 鈥渟tarted out examining the roles of phospholipid molecules in sperm development. This project grew out of a collaboration with the lab of at Albert Einstein College of Medicine.鈥 Dr. Jenny's lab had previously characterized Combover's role in wing development, but when they noticed the mutant flies were male sterile, 鈥渢hey asked us to help them elucidate its role in male fertility. Our unpublished data suggest that Combover not only helps the individualization machinery track along the sperm tails but also helps pull the cell membranes around the individualizing sperm, which involves a connection with the phospholipids (the main molecular components of cell membranes).鈥
