- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Research molecular biologist Dana Nayduch of the Agricultural Research Service, U. S. Department of Agriculture (USDA-ARS), will speak on "Can Surveying Microbial Communities of House Flies Help Us Understand Emerging Threats to Animal and Human Health?" at 4:10 p.m., Wednesday, March 1 in 122 Briggs Hall, Kleiber Hall Drive, UC Davis campus.
Her lecture also will be virtual. The Zoom link:
https://ucdavis.zoom.us/j/95882849672
Nayduch, based in Manhattan, Kansas, will be introduced by her colleague, medical entomologist-geneticist Geoffrey Attardo, assistant professor, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology.
"Dana is doing very cool work with house flies and looking at how bacteria in the fly are trading antibiotic resistance genes among themselves," said Attardo. "It's an interesting and scary system as antibiotic resistance is so high due to antibiotic usage in livestock rearing."
"House flies (Musca domestica L.) are ubiquitous, cosmopolitan pests inhabiting urban, rural and agricultural environments throughout the world. In these habitats acquire microbes from septic substrates that are used for feeding and reproduction, Nayduch says in her abstract. "Flies subsequently harbor and disseminate these microorganisms which may pose a risk to human and animal health. Our research characterizes and analyzes microbial communities of house flies using culture-based and molecular approaches in order to better understand their roles in the transmission of important bacterial disease agents and/or antimicrobial resistance. Because the microbial communities within house flies represent a snapshot of the microbes found in their local habitat, we also gain valuable insight into existing and emerging microbial threats to humanand animal health through our surveys which can help in predicting and preventing disease."
A pre-seminar coffee will take place from 3:30 to 4:10 in 158 Briggs.
Dana received her bachelor's degree in animal science from Rutgers University and her doctorate in zoology from Clemson University, where she studied house flies as vectors for pathogens. She served as a postdoctoral fellow at Yale University School of Public Health, working on molecular-genetic studies of tsetse flies. She then joined Georgia Southern University (GSU) as an assistant professor of biology in 2004, advancing to associate professor in 2009. At GSU she received NIH-R15 funding to study house fly-microbe molecular interactions.
Active in the Entomological Society of America (ESA), Nayduch is the vice president-elect of the Medical, Urban and Veterinary Entomology (MUVE) Section. A peer reviewer for the Journal of Medical Entomology and an editorial board member and subject editor for Annals for ESA, she organized and edited the first special collection for Annals: “Filth Fly-Microbe Interactions."
The UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology's winter seminars are held on Wednesdays at 4:10 p.m. in 122 Briggs Hall. All are virtual. Urban landscape entomologist Emily Meineke, assistant professor, coordinates the seminars. (See schedule.) She may be reached at ekmeineke@ucdavis.edu for technical issues.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
McReynolds, who co-founded EicOsis Human Health LLC with Hammock and served two years as its director of research, is its newly appointed chief executive officer. She succeeds Hammock, who has transitioned to chief scientific officer and chairman of the board of directors.
EicOsis, based in Davis, is a leader in the clinical development of soluble epoxide hydrolase inhibitors (sEH), an innovative approach to treating chronic inflammation and pain. Hammock's pioneering work on the sEH inhibitors spans 50 years.
“Dr. McReynolds will lead EicOsis through the commercialization of its new therapeutic solution for chronic conditions that affects tens of millions of people, including those with neuropathic pain but also osteoarthritis, Alzheimer's disease, and Parkinson's disease,” said Glenn Croston, chief operating officer. “Dr. McReynolds has deep experience advancing drugs through preclinical and clinical development, including EicOsis' leading drug EC5026. In addition, she has published extensively on the science of sEH as an important new drug target.”
McReynolds, who received her doctorate in pharmacology/toxicology from UC Davis in 2021, studying with Hammock, said “it's been an amazing opportunity being involved with EicOsis as an early preclinical stage company and seeing the transition of our lead candidate to clinical
“The scientific validation of our approach supports a truly disruptive product that could provide a safe, non-addictive, and effective treatment for pain and neurodegeneration, and I look forward to leading the company as we obtain clinical validation,” she said. “We have an experienced and dedicated team that has a long history of working together, and I am excited to continue working together in this exciting next stage.”
EicOsis has “completed the human phase 1a safety trials with no adverse effects," said Hammock, who holds a joint appointment with the UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology and the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Key Role. “As co-founder, Cindy has played a key role building EicOsis into a leader in therapeutics targeting sEH,” Hammock said. "Cindy's scientific insight, drive, and commitment ideally positions her to take EicOsis to the next level and builds on the vast body of science validating our approach. I know Cindy will continue to deliver great results for EicOsis and for a great many patients."
Hammock, in his role as CSO, “will continue to deliver cutting edge progress in translating soluble epoxide hydrolase inhibitors into clinical results,” Croston announced. A member of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Inventors, Hammock co-founded and built the company to translate these findings into "a revolutionary new solution for chronic inflammation and pain."
“We'd like to thank Bruce for his incredible leadership in the field and as CEO of EicOsis," said Chris Somerville, board member of EicOsis Human Health. "We're looking forward to his continued scientific leadership and to his continued support in Cindy's new role."
McReynolds, who has researched the biological activity of lipid mediators for the past 12 years, said her current efforts “focus on understanding the roles of lipid mediators in inflammation especially relating to pain and degenerative disease. My research focuses on developing tools for use in in vitro and in vivo knockout studies to understand their role in inflammation with a focus on mechanism of pharmacokinetics.”
Always aiming for a scientific career, McReynolds received a bachelor's degree (1999) in animal science from UC Davis and a master's degree (2001) in animal science from Washington State University (WSU). Her career advanced from senior research associate, Celera (formerly Axys) in South San Francisco to senior associate scientist of Miikana, Fremont, to project coordinator of Arete Therapeutics, South San Francisco, to UC Davis researcher.
At UC Davis, she served as the scientific program manager (2010-2017) for the Center for Integrative Toxicology, and as a graduate student researcher. She won a UC Davis Staff Assembly Citation of Excellence in Research in 2021. She earlier received the UC Davis 1999 Outstanding Senior Award, and several awards fromWSU: the 2000 Dr.Erb Outstanding Graduate Student Award; the 2001 Teaching Assistant of the Year, and the 2001 Outstanding Graduate Student. While a graduate student, she was supported by a National Institutes of Health Chemical Biology Training Grant.
Insect Developmental Biology. Sarjeet Gill, now a UC Riverside distinguished emeritus professor, and Hammock co-discovered sEH in 1969 in mice when they were researching insect developmental biology and green insecticides in the UC Berkeley lab of John Casida (1929-2018). Both hold doctorates from UC Berkeley.
Hammock explained that the enzyme is a key regulatory enzyme involved in the metabolism of fatty acids. It regulates a new class of natural chemical mediators, which in turn regulates inflammation, blood pressure, pain and other key biologies. Hammock's 50-year research has led to the discovery that many regulatory molecules are controlled as much by degradation as biosynthesis. "The epoxy fatty acids rapidly degraded by the sEH," Hammock said, "control blood pressure, fibrosis, immunity, tissue growth, depression, pain, and inflammation, to name a few processes."
Approximately 50 million Americans (20 percent of the population) suffer from chronic pain, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. The annual economic toll is $560 billion, encompassing direct medical expenses, lost productivity, and disability claims. Pain research is now one of the top priorities of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
EicOsis (pronounced eye-co-sis), derives its name from eicosanoid, “the major backbone of chemical mediators in the arachidonate cascade,” said McReynolds. “It symbolizes the epoxide group in chemistry, which is key to the anti-inflammatory chemical mediators and where the biochemical target called soluble epoxide hydrolase works.”
EicOsis won the “Sacramento Region Innovator of the Year” award in the medical health/biopharmaceutical category in 2019.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
But that's the case with UC Davis doctoral student Grace Horne. Her undergraduate thesis about the effects of the decline of ash trees on native caterpillars, scored the cover of the February edition of the journal Environmental Entomology. Or, should we say, it "graced" the cover.
The paper, “Specialist Herbivore Performance on Introduced Plants During Native Host Decline,” is co-authored by Ria Manderino of the Oak Spring Garden Foundation, Upperville, VA and Samuel Jaffe of The Caterpillar Lab, Marlborough, N.H.
“Our publication highlights the importance of multispecies assessments of host plant acceptance,” said Horne, who studies plant-insect interactions, urban ecology, global change biology, natural history and community science in the laboratory of urban landscape entomologist Emily Meineke, assistant professor, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology.
“We tested three related species, two of them congeners, on their ability to accept alternative host plants in the face of the loss of their primary host," Horne said. "We found a diversity of responses even among these three species. Further downstream, landscape managers may be able to use our results to make decisions about which plantings will help support native herbivores.”
Jaffe provided the cover image of a Sphinx kalmiae, commonly known as "laurel sphinx."
The abstract:
Ash (Fraxinus spp.) is in rapid decline across the northeastern USA due to the invasive emerald ash borer (Agrilus planipennis Fairmaire). Three recently co-occurring confamilial species may serve as alternative larval host plants for ash-reliant Lepidoptera. These prospective hosts are nonnative shrubs often planted in managed suburban landscapes and are sometimes invasive or naturalized in North America. Given the imminent decline of ash trees, we considered potential downstream effects on insect herbivores historically specialized on ash foliage. We measured the performance of three ash-specialist hawkmoths (Lepidoptera: Sphingidae) on native white ash (Fraxinus americana L.) and alternative host plants: common lilac (Syringa vulgaris L.), weeping forsythia [Forsythia suspensa (Thunb.) Vahl], and European privet (Ligustrum vulgare L.). We found the nonnative host plants provided varied support for larval survival to pupation, with biomass and growth rate affected differently by both plant and insect identity. Nearly all caterpillars reared on one alternative host, European privet, exhibited distinct malformations of the wing buds at pupation. Given caterpillar presence on privet in the field, privet may constitute an ecological trap (i.e., when female moths select a sub-optimal host, offspring survival and fitness are reduced). This work demonstrates how performance testing can reveal species-specific effects of host plant loss on mono- or oligophagous insects. For some ash specialists, alternative nonnative host plants may be suboptimal, but some cultivated host plants may be able to support certain specialist insects during native host decline. We suggest that landscaping decisions can be tailored to support threatened insect species."
Graduate of Colby College. Grace is a 2021 graduate of Colby College, Waterville, Maine, where she majored in biology (evolution and ecology), and environmental science (conservation biology), receiving magna cum laude (with distinction) in both majors. Her thesis: “Reduced Performance of Ash-Specialist Caterpillars on Nonnative, Cultivated Oleaceous Plants.”
Horne joined the Meineke lab in 2021 after serving as an education staff member and undergraduate researcher at The Caterpillar Lab, Marlborough, N.H. from 2018-2021. The environmental education organization focuses on inviting people—youth and adults alike—to share in stories of ecology, evolution, and natural history. Horne presented at more than 30 venues, including elementary school classrooms, botanical gardens, and children's museums, "with a goal to ignite in us a curiosity of the world we live in, from the smallest leaf-miners to the tallest trees."
Horne gained experience in conservation and education in the spring of 2020 when she participated in the Round River Conservation Studies in Maun, Botswana. The environmental organization operates at the nexus of conservation and education to explore the complex relationship between conservation, people, and wildlife, mostly in Mababe, Botswana. "We worked with local experts to design and maintain wildlife monitoring systems to be used to substantiate economic and environmental decisions," she related.
Check out the recent feature, For Ash-Dependent Insects, Some Plants Make Good Alternatives—But Others Don't, in the Entomological Society of America's Entomology Today publication.
Picnic Day Co-Chair. You'll be able to see more of Horne's leadership at the 109th annual UC Davis Picnic Day on April 15. Horne, active in the UC Davis Entomology Graduate Students' Association (EGSA), is co-chairing the entomological activities with forensic entomologist Robert Kimsey of the Department of Entomology and Nematology faculty.
The entomological events, held at Briggs Hall and the Bohart Museum of Entomology, are both educational and entertaining. At Briggs Hall, look for forest, medical and agricultural entomology displays, and participate in cockroach races, maggot art, and scores of other activities. And over at the Bohart Museum of Entomology, check out the insect specimens and hold such critters as Madagascar hissing cockroaches and stick insects in the live "petting zoo."
Last year Horne displayed pipevine swallowtails, Battus philenor, munching on their host plant, Dutchman's pipe, Aristolochia macrophylla.
"Picnic Day," as the officials say on their website, "is one of UC Davis' most revered traditions and serves as the university's annual Open House for prospective and current students, families, alumni, staff, faculty, and the greater Davis and regional communities."
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
That would include the larvae of Tuta absoluta, a South American tomato leafminer. In its adult stage, it's a moth in the family Gelechilidae. In its larval stage, it's a major agricultural pest.
Since 2008, it has invaded much of Europe, northern Africa, and the Middle East, according to a California Department of Food and Agriculture post.
It hasn't yet invaded the United States, but scientists say it has moved from South America as far north as Costa Rica.
The bug "is a serious and devastating pest of tomatoes, causing crop losses as high as 80 to 100% in areas where it is found," according to a Pest Alert article published by the UC Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program. "This insect bores into leaves, stems, flowers, and fruit, often leaving the fruit unmarketable and altering plant growth structure through destruction of stem apical buds or flower buds. To manage this insect, growers may be forced to greatly increase the number of insecticide applications to their tomato crops."
The article, by UC Davis scientists Kris Godfrey of the Contained Research Facility, and Frank Zalom and Joanna Chiu, both of the Department of Entomology and Nematology, points out that the "South American tomato leafminer spreads via commercial trade of plants and fruit infested with eggs, larvae, and pupae. The adult moths can fly, but it is not known if this movement contributes significantly to its spread. There are numerous regulations in place that should limit the spread of the South American tomato leafminer in imported commercial tomato plants and fruit. However, movement of fruit and plants by private individuals is not as strongly regulated."
Enter Kyle Lewald, a doctoral candidate in the laboratory of UC Davis molecular geneticist/physiologist Joanna Chiu. He will present his exit seminar on "Using Genomic Data to Understand and Prevent the Spread of Tuta absoluta" at 4:10 p.m., Wednesday, Feb. 22 in 122 Briggs and also on Zoom. The Zoom link:
https://ucdavis.zoom.us/j/95882849672.
Chiu, professor and vice chair, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, will introduce him.
"Tuta absoluta is a serious agricultural pest of tomato plants," Lewald says in his abstract. "While initially discovered in Peru, it has rapidly invaded tomato fields around the world over the past century, causing widespread damage to the industry. The recent affordability of whole genome sequencing of insects opens the door to a wide number of applications to understand and control this pest."
"Using long read sequencing, we produced and annotated a highly contiguous T. absoluta genome assembly," Lewald noted. "Sequencing of individuals collected across many locations in Latin America allowed us to investigate population structure and diversity levels, as well as identify divergence times and possible migration events occurring between regions. Understanding these historical events can be key to predicting and preventing future invasion events. We also used comparative genomics between morphologically similar gelechiid species to develop efficient molecular diagnostics, allowing field researchers and stakeholders to identify Tuta absoluta rapidly to support quarantine and treatment efforts."
Lewald, who holds a bachelor's degree in molecular and cell biology (2016) from UC Berkeley joined the Chiu lab in 2018.
The UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology's winter seminars are held on Wednesdays at 4:10 p.m. in 122 Briggs Hall. All are virtual. Urban landscape entomologist Emily Meineke, assistant professor, coordinates the seminars. (See schedule.) She may be reached at ekmeineke@ucdavis.edu for technical issues.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Well, if you were high school student Ziya Akmal, he journeyed--by car--nearly 400 miles from his home in Los Angeles to attend the 12th annual UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day on Saturday, Feb. 18 on the University of California, Davis, campus.
Biodiversity Museum Day, billed as a Super Science Day, is an annual opportunity to meet the scientists, see their work, and ask questions. It's a great opportunity for students to gain career ideas, said Biodiversity Museum Day chair and co-founder Tabatha Yang, education and outreach coordinator for the Bohart Museum of Entomology.
Akmal said he hopes to enroll in UC Davis, major in entomology, and study ants with Professor Phil Ward, an international authority on ant systematics. Akmal met with the professor in his Briggs Hall office, and talked to three Ward lab members--and one alumnus--at their table in the Academic Surge Building on Crocker Lane.
The Biodiversity Museum Day showcased 11 museums and collections, drawing almost 2000 visitors alone to the Academic Surge Building, where the Bohart Museum of Entomology and the Museum of Wildlife and Fish Biology provided displays. More displays lined the Academic Surge hallway: the Phil Ward lab (ants), the Jason Bond lab (spiders), and the Bohart Museum's separate petting zoos (Madagascar hissing cockroaches and stick insects). Martin Hauser, senior insect biosystematist at the California Department of Food and Agriculture and a regular volunteer at the Biodiversity Museum Day, delighted visitors with a scorpion that he fluoresced.
But across the hall from Hauser were "The Ant People" or "The Myrmecologists" from the Ward lab, who staffed a table and answered questions about not only ants, but a wide variety of arthropods. Doctoral candidates Jill Oberski and Zachary Griebenow and third-year doctoral student Ziv Lieberman were there, as was 2020 alumnus and ant researcher Brendon Boudinot, an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow at the Institute of Zoology and Evolutionary Research at Friedrich Schiller University Jena.
Those who listened to Professor Ward deliver a webinar on ants at the 10th annual Biodiversity Museum Day (during COVID-19 pandemic), remembered his presentation (see https://youtu.be/d8eRNsD8dxo.) Ants originated about 120 million years ago (early Cretaceous period), evolving from "wasp-like creatures," Ward said in his webinar. California has some 300 species of ants, but thousands more are in the tropics. Globally, "there may be as many as 40,000 to 50,000 species of ants," but only about 14,000 are described.
Boudinot, Griebenow and Oberski are veterans of UC Davis teams that won national championships in the Entomological Society of America's Entomology Games or "Bug Bowls." The Games, played between university-sponsored student teams, are lively question-and-answer, college bowl-style competitions on entomological facts. To date, UC Davis teams have won four national championships: 2022, 2018, 2016 and 2015.
The UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day is traditionally held on Presidents' Day weekend. It's free and family friendly.