Sex-specific dysregulation of cardiac-enriched microRNAs with age in Drosophila melanogaster | American Journal of Physiology-Cell Physiology | American Physiological Society Dysregulation of cardiac-enriched microRNA (miRNA) expression is linked to age-associated cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). However, the sex-specificity and age at which dysregulation occurs remain uncl...

Varghese, L. N., Sheard, P. W., Schwenke, D. O., Katare, R. (2025). Sex-specific dysregulation of cardiac-enriched microRNAs with age in Drosophila melanogaster Am J Physiol Cell Physiol, 328(6):C1743-c1751 journals.physiology.org/doi/full/10....

Huang, Y., Gao, Z. Y., Ly, K., Lin, L., Lambooij, J. P., King, E. G., Janssen, A., Wei, K. H., Lee, Y. C. G. (2025). Polymorphic transposable elements contribute to variation in recombination landscapes Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, 122(12):e2427312122 www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

Preussner, M., Bischoff, M., Onel, S. F. (2025). mir-276a Is Required for Muscle Development in Drosophila and Regulates the FGF Receptor Heartless During the Migration of Nascent Myotubes in the Testis. Cells, 14(5) www.mdpi.com/2073-4409/14...

Taira, Y., Zhu, L. and Fukunaga, R. (2025). RNA-binding protein Miso/CG44249 is crucial for minor splicing during oogenesis in Drosophila Rna, 31(6):822-835 rnajournal.cshlp.org/content/31/6...

Voichek, M., Bernhard, A., Novatchkova, M., Handler, D., Moseneder, P., Rafanel, B., Duchek, P., Senti, K. A., Brennecke, J. (2025). Direct cell-to-cell transmission of retrotransposons bioRxiv, www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Voichek, M., Bernhard, A., Novatchkova, M., Handler, D., Moseneder, P., Rafanel, B., Duchek, P., Senti, K. A., Brennecke, J. (2025). Direct cell-to-cell transmission of retrotransposons bioRxiv, www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

On the use of kinship and familiarity associated social information in mediating Drosophila melanogaster oviposition decisions Decisions where an individual lays their eggs are important, as the choice may affect their offspring’s survival and lifetime reproductive success. Information produced by conspecifics can potentially...

Rakosy, E., Talagala, S., Long, T. A. F. (2025). On the use of kinship and familiarity associated social information in mediating Drosophila melanogaster oviposition decisions PLoS One, 20(3):e0320377 journals.plos.org/plosone/arti...

Liao, M., Liu, Y., Xu, Z., Fang, M., Yu, Z., Cui, Y., Sun, Z., ...., Thakkar, N., Hardin, P. E., Golden, S. S., Zhang, E. E. (2025). The P-loop NTPase RUVBL2 is a conserved clock component across eukaryotes Nature, 642(8066):165-173 pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40140583/

Varone, M., Di Lillo, P., Nikolouli, K., ..., Saccone, G., Bourtzis, K., Salvemini, M. (2025). The Early Sex-Specific Expression of the Fruitless Gene in the Asian Tiger Mosquito and Its Functional Conservation in Male Courtship. Insects, 16(3) www.mdpi.com/2075-4450/16...

Wolbachia-mediated reduction in the glutamate receptor mGluR promotes female promiscuity and bacterial spread The mechanisms by which parasites mediate host behavioral changes remain largely unexplored. Warecki et al. describe a molecular mechanism for how the endosymbiont Wolbachia induces increased mating i...

Warecki, B., Vega, G., Fowler, S., Hartzog, G., Karr, T. L., Sullivan, W. (2025). Wolbachia-mediated reduction in the glutamate receptor mGluR promotes female promiscuity and bacterial spread Cell Rep, 44(5):115629 www.cell.com/cell-reports...

The role of molecular weight on chitosan and chitosan oligosaccharides in sleep regulation: Integrating network pharmacology and multi-omics analysis in Drosophila This study aims to investigate the sleep-regulating effects of chitosan (COS) with different molecular weights (1 kDa, 3 kDa and 30 kDa). Network phar…

Liang, Y., Jiang, K., Liu, Z., ..., Hardiman, G., Guo, X., Zhu, B. (2025). The role of chitosan and chitosan oligosaccharides in sleep regulation: Integrating network pharmacology and multi-omics analysis in Drosophila. Int J Biol Macromol, 308(Pt 3): www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Enhanced memory despite severe sleep loss in Drosophila insomniac mutants Sleep is known to support memory. In this study, the authors identify an instance where memory hyperfunction may actually provoke sleep deficits. They find that the short-sleep Drosophila mutants, ins...

Huang, S., Piao, C., Zhao, Z., Beuschel, C. B., Turrel, O., Toppe, D., Sigrist, S. J. (2025). Enhanced memory despite severe sleep loss in Drosophila insomniac mutants PLoS Biol, 23(3):e3003076 journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

Neuman, S. D., Thakur, R. S., Gratz, S. J., O'Connor-Giles, K. M., Bashirullah, A. (2025). Neurodegenerative and Neurodevelopmental Roles for Bulk Lipid Transporters VPS13A and BLTP2. Mov Disord, movementdisorders.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Nagori, R., Vigoreaux, J. O. (2025). beta-hydroxy-beta-methylbutyrate Attenuates Age-Dependent Loss of Flight Ability and Extends Lifespan in Drosophila Int J Mol Sci, 26(6) www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/26...

Longitudinal multi-omics in alpha-synuclein Drosophila model discriminates disease- from age-associated pathologies in Parkinson’s disease - npj Parkinson's Disease npj Parkinson's Disease - Longitudinal multi-omics in alpha-synuclein Drosophila model discriminates disease- from age-associated pathologies in Parkinson’s disease

Moore, J., Wu, T., Dhindsa, J., ..., Shulman, J. M., Al-Ramahi, I., Botas, J. (2025). Longitudinal multi-omics in alpha-synuclein Drosophila model discriminates disease- from age-associated pathologies in Parkinson's disease. NPJ Parkinsons Dis, 11(1):46 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Developmental mitochondrial complex I activity determines lifespan - EMBO Reports Aberrant mitochondrial function has been associated with an increasingly large number of human disease states. Observations from in vivo models where mitochondrial function is altered suggest that maladaptations to mitochondrial dysfunction may underpin disease pathology. We hypothesized that the severity of this maladaptation could be shaped by the plasticity of the system when mitochondrial dysfunction manifests. To investigate this, we have used inducible fly models of mitochondrial complex I (CI) dysfunction to reduce mitochondrial function at two stages of the fly lifecycle, from early development and adult eclosion. Here, we show that in early life (developmental) mitochondrial dysfunction results in severe reductions in survival and stress resistance in adulthood, while flies where mitochondrial function is perturbed from adulthood, are long-lived and stress resistant despite having up to a 75% reduction in CI activity. After excluding developmental defects as a cause, we went on to molecularly characterize these two populations of mitochondrially compromised flies, short- and long-lived. We find that our short-lived flies have unique transcriptomic, proteomic and metabolomic responses, which overlap significantly in discrete models of CI dysfunction. Our data demonstrate that early mitochondrial dysfunction via CI depletion elicits a maladaptive response, which severely reduces survival, while CI depletion from adulthood is insufficient to reduce survival and stress resistance.

Stefanatos, R., Robertson, F., Castejon-Vega, B., Yu, Y., Uribe, A., Myers, K., Kataura, T., Korolchuk, V. I., Maddocks, O. D. K., Martins, L. M., Sanz, A. (2025). Developmental mitochondrial complex I activity determines lifespan EMBO Rep, 26(8):1957-1983 link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Poudel, S., Chuang, C. L., Shrestha, H. K., Demontis, F. (2025). Pan-PTM profiling identifies post-translational modifications associated with exceptional longevity and preservation of skeletal muscle function in Drosophila NPJ Aging, 11(1):23 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Pollington, H. Q., Doe, C. Q. (2025). The Hunchback transcription factor determines interneuron molecular identity, morphology, and presynapse targeting in the Drosophila NB5-2 lineage PLoS Biol, 23(3):e3002881 journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

olf413 an octopamine biogenesis pathway gene is required for axon growth and pathfinding during embryonic nervous system development in Drosophila melanogaster - BMC Research Notes Objective Neurotransmitters have been extensively studied as neural communication molecules. Genetic associations discovered, and indirect intervention studies in Humans and mammals have led to a general proposition that neurotransmitters have a role in structuring of neuronal network during development. olf413 is a Drosophila gene annotated as coding for dopamine beta-monooxygenase enzyme with a predicted function in octopaminergic pathway. The biological function of this gene is very little worked out. In this study we investigate the requirement of olf413 gene function for octopamine biogenesis and developmental patterning of embryonic nervous system. Result In our study we have used the newly characterized neuronal specific allele olf413SG1.1, and the gene disruption strain olf413MI02014 to dissect out the function of olf413. olf413 has an enhancer activity as depicted by reporter GFP expression, in the embryonic ventral nerve cord, peripheral nervous system and the somatic muscle bundles. Homozygous loss of function mutants show reduced levels of octopamine, and this finding supports the proposed function of the gene in octopamine biogenesis. Further, loss of function of olf413 causes embryonic lethality. FasII staining of these embryos reveal a range of phenotypes in the central and peripheral motor nerves, featuring axonal growth, pathfinding, branching and misrouting defects. Our findings are important as they implicate a key functional requirement of this gene in precise axonal patterning events, a novel developmental role imparted for an octopamine biosynthesis pathway gene in structuring of embryonic nervous system.

Ramya, R., Venkatesh, C. R., Shyamala, B. V. (2024). olf413 an octopamine biogenesis pathway gene is required for axon growth and pathfinding during embryonic nervous system development in Drosophila melanogaster BMC Res Notes, 17(1):46 link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Hunter, I., Coulson, B., Pettini, T., Davies, J. J., Parkin, J., Landgraf, M., Baines, R. A. (2024). Balance of activity during a critical period tunes a developing network Elife, 12. elifesciences.org/articles/91599

Bui, K. C., Kamiyama, D. (2024). Adjacent Neuronal Fascicle Guides Motoneuron 24 Dendritic Branching and Axonal Routing Decisions through Dscam1 Signaling. bioRxiv www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

McLamb, F., Feng, Z., Vu, J. P., Griffin, L., Vasquez, M. F., Bozinovic, G. (2024). Lagging Brain Gene Expression Patterns of Drosophila melanogaster Young Adult Males Confound Comparisons Between Sexes. Molecular neurobiology link.springer.com/article/10.1...

Lefebvre, M., Colen, J., Claussen, N., Brauns, F., Raich, M., Mitchell, N., Fruchart, M., Vitelli, V., Streichan, S. J. (2024). Learning a conserved mechanism for early neuroectoderm morphogenesis. ArXiv pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

Padash Barmchi, M., Hassan, R. N., ..., Collins, Q. P., Grunsted, M. J. (2025). Drosophila model of HPV18-Induced pathogenesis reveals a role for E6 oncogene in regulation of NF-kappaB and Wnt to inhibit apoptosis Tumour Virus Res, 19:200316 www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Molano-Fernandez, M., Hickson, I. D., Herranz, H. (2025). Replication stress promotes cellular transformation in Drosophila epithelium. Cell Death Discov, 11(1):96 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Hirata, M., Nomura, T., Inoue, Y. H. (2025). Anti-Tumor Effects of Cecropin A and Drosocin Incorporated into Macrophage-like Cells Against Hematopoietic Tumors in Drosophila mxc Mutants Cells, 14(6) pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC...

Tsai, M., Sun, J., Alexandre, C., Shapiro, M., Franchet, A., Li, Y., Gould, A. P., Vincent, J. P., Stockinger, B., Diny, N. L. (2025). Drosophila AHR limits tumor growth and stem cell proliferation in the intestine Wellcome Open Res, 10:38 wellcomeopenresearch.org/articles/10-...

Non-gonadal PIWIL1/Aubergine drives regenerative and tumorigenic stem cell proliferation in the intestine Expression and function of classical germline genes are reported in somatic tissues. Bellec et al. report damage-inducible upregulation and function of the PIWI protein Aubergine in regenerating intes...

Bellec, K., Carroll, L. R., Pennel, K., ..., Edwards, J., Myant, K., Hayashi, R., Cordero, J. B. (2026). Non-gonadal PIWIL1/Aubergine drives regenerative and tumorigenic stem cell proliferation and tumorigenesis in the intestine Cell Rep, 45(4):117186 www.cell.com/cell-reports...

Epithelial cell competition is promoted by signaling from immune cells - Nature Communications In the fruit fly Drosophila, juxtaposition of phenotypically different cells can lead to cell competition, resulting in killing of one of the two cell types, followed by removal of the dead cells by p...

Zhu, Y., Wunderlich, Z., Lander, A. D. (2025). Epithelial cell competition is promoted by signaling from immune cells Nat Commun, 16(1):3710 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Kotb, N. M., Ulukaya, G., Ramamoorthy, A., Park, L. S., Tang, J., Hasson, D., Rangan, P. (2025). TORC1-driven translation of Nucleoporin44A promotes chromatin remodeling and germ cell-to-maternal transition in Drosophila bioRxiv, www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...