Flies & aging. Recent review.

Demontis F, Piccirillo R, Goldberg AL, Perrimon N. The influence of skeletal muscle on systemic aging and lifespan. Aging Cell. 2013 Jun 26. PMID: 23802635.

From the abstract: "... we review recent studies in mammals and Drosophila highlighting how nutrient- and stress-sensing in skeletal muscle can influence lifespan and overall aging ..."

Copper homeostasis, Alzheimer's, Presenilin and fly models. Recent report.

Southon A, Greenough MA, Ganio G, Bush AI, Burke R, Camakaris J. Presenilin promotes dietary copper uptake. PLoS One. 2013 May 7;8(5):e62811. PMID: 23667524; PMCID: PMC3646984.

Nutrition, leucine and a new fly model of Birt-Hogg-Dubé syndrome. Recent report.

In this paper, the authors describe disruption of Drosophila BHD (Folliculin), an ortholog of a tumor suppressor gene associated with the inherited skin disorder Birt-Hogg-Dubé Syndrome. They go on to characterize the mutant phenotype and look at the impact of nutritional interventions on phenotype severity.

Liu W, Chen Z, Ma Y, Wu X, Jin Y, Hou S. Genetic Characterization of the Drosophila Birt-Hogg-Dubé Syndrome Gene. PLoS One. 2013 Jun 17;8(6):e65869. PMID: 23799055.

From the abstract: "Our work provides a new animal model of the BHD syndrome and suggests that modulation of the local nutrient condition might be a potential treatment of the BHD lesions."

Fly models of sleep disorders. Recent review.

Freeman AA, Syed S, Sanyal S. Modeling the genetic basis for human sleep disorders in Drosophila. Commun Integr Biol. 2013 Jan 1;6(1):e22733. PMID: 23802043.

From the abstract: "Sleep research in Drosophila is ... making impressive strides towards helping us understand the biological basis for and the purpose of sleep ..."

New fly model of epilepsy. Sodium channels. Recent report.

Howlett IC, Rusan ZM, Parker L, Tanouye MA. Drosophila as a Model for Intractable Epilepsy: gilgamesh Suppresses Seizures in parabss1 Heterozygote Flies. G3 (Bethesda). 2013 Jun 24. PMID: 23797108.

Fly models, oxidative stress, cell death, and Parkinson's disease. Recent report.

Hwang S, Song S, Hong YK, Choi G, Suh YS, Han SY, Lee M, Park SH, Lee JH, Lee S, Bang SM, Jeong Y, Chung WJ, Lee IS, Jeong G, Chung J, Cho KS. Drosophila DJ-1 decreases neural sensitivity to stress by negatively regulating Daxx-like protein through dFOXO. PLoS Genet. 2013 Apr;9(4):e1003412. PMID: 23593018; PMCID: PMC3616925.

Fly study related to Rett syndrome and Angelman syndrome. Recent report.

Kim S, Chahrour M, Ben-Shachar S, Lim J. Ube3a/E6AP is involved in a subset of MeCP2 functions. Biochem Biophys Res Commun. 2013 Jun 19. PMID: 23791832.

New approach for study of learning and memory in flies. Relevance to disease-related study. Recent report.

The authors indicate relevance to "neurological pathologies such as Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, addiction, epilepsy and autism spectrum disorders."

Mejia M, Heghinian MD, Marí F, Godenschwege TA. New Tools for Targeted Disruption of Cholinergic Synaptic Transmission in Drosophila melanogaster. PLoS One. 2013 May 30;8(5):e64685. PMID: 23737994; PMCID: PMC3667824.

Genetic modifiers related to spinal muscular atrophy. Recent report.

Sen A, Dimlich DN, Guruharsha KG, Kankel MW, Hori K, Yokokura T, Brachat S, Richardson D, Loureiro J, Sivasankaran R, Curtis D, Davidow LS, Rubin LL, Hart AC, Van Vactor D, Artavanis-Tsakonas S. Genetic circuitry of Survival motor neuron, the gene underlying spinal muscular atrophy. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2013 Jun 11. PMID: 23757500.

From the abstract: "... we applied in vivo, in vitro, and in silico approaches to identify genetic and biochemical interactors of the Drosophila SMN homolog."

The physiology of alcohol dependence. Recent review.

From the abstract: "... Drosophila show conserved alcohol tolerance and withdrawal phenotypes indicating that Drosophila genetics can now be used ..." Robinson BG, Khurana S, Atkinson NS. Drosophila larvae as a model to study physiological alcohol dependence. Commun Integr Biol. 2013 Mar 1;6(2):e23501. PMID: 23750304; PMCID: PMC3609852.

Retinal degeneration/dystrophy & the fly. Recent report.

Lee J, Song M, Hong S. Negative Regulation of the Novel norpA(P24) Suppressor, diehard4, in the Endo-lysosomal Trafficking Underlies Photoreceptor Cell Degeneration. PLoS Genet. 2013 un;9(6):e1003559. Epub 2013 Jun 6. PMID: 23754968.

From the abstract:  "Our results demonstrate the existence of negative regulation in vesicular traffic between endosomes and lysosomes. We anticipate that the identification of additional components and an in-depth description of this specific molecular machinery will aid in therapeutic interventions of various retinal dystrophies and GPCR-related human diseases."

Using flies to study drug-resistant Staphylococcus aureus.

This report is freely available at PubMed Central.

Wu K, Conly J, Surette M, Sibley C, Elsayed S, Zhang K. Assessment of virulence diversity of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus strains with a Drosophila melanogaster infection model. BMC Microbiol. PMID: 23176146; PMCID: PMC3539928.

Methods Report: Purification of Fragile-X protein ortholog complexes from Drosophila cells

Miyoshi K, Ogino A, Siomi MC, Siomi H. Purification of dFMR1-Containing Complexes Using Tandem Affinity Purification. Methods Mol Biol. 2013;1010:111-21. PMID: 23754222.

New fly model: VCP mutation-dependent degeneration. Recent report.

Kim NC, Tresse E, Kolaitis RM, Molliex A, Thomas RE, Alami NH, Wang B, Joshi A, Smith RB, Ritson GP, Winborn BJ, Moore J, Lee JY, Yao TP, Pallanck L, Kundu M, Taylor JP. VCP is essential for mitochondrial quality control by PINK1/Parkin and this function is impaired by VCP mutations. Neuron. 2013 Apr 10;78(1):65-80. PMID: 23498974.

From the abstract: "Mutations in VCP cause multisystem degeneration impacting the nervous system, muscle, and/or bone. Patients may present with ALS, Parkinsonism, frontotemporal dementia, myopathy, Paget's disease, or a combination of these. The disease mechanism is unknown. We developed a Drosophila model of VCP mutation-dependent degeneration."

A related paper using human cells appears in the same issue of the journal. Bartolome et al. Pathogenic VCP mutations induce mitochondrial uncoupling and reduced ATP levels. Neuron. 2013 Apr 10;78(1):57-64. PMID: 23498975.

Oxidative stress & a GALT-null Drosophila model of classic galactosemia. Recent report.

Jumbo-Lucioni PP, Hopson ML, Hang D, Liang Y, Jones DP, Fridovich-Keil JL. Oxidative stress contributes to outcome severity in a Drosophila melanogaster model of classic galactosemia. Dis Model Mech. 2013 Jan;6(1):84-94. PMID: 22773758; PMCID: PMC3529341.

From the Translantion Impact statement:  "These findings indicate that oxidative stress and/or the physiological response to oxidative stress might play a role in classic galactosemia in humans, opening up new opportunities for diagnosis, prognosis and treatment."

Injury, the gut and cancer. Recent report.

Guo Z, Driver I, Ohlstein B. Injury-induced BMP signaling negatively regulates Drosophila midgut homeostasis. J Cell Biol. 2013 Jun 3. PMID: 23733344.

From the abstract: "Loss of BMP signaling pathway members ...  resulted in phenotypes similar to those described for juvenile polyposis syndrome ... Our data ... may provide insight into how BMP signaling mutations drive formation of human intestinal cancers."

Fly model of calcium overload-induced necrosis. Relevance to several diseases. Recent methods report.

Liu K, Li Y, Liu L. Modeling calcium-overload mediated necrosis in Drosophila. Methods Mol Biol. 2013;1004:203-13. PMID: 23733579.

Flies, sleep & Alzheimers. Recent report.

From the abstract:  "Our findings reveal a novel mechanism for Tip60 mediated sleep-wake regulation ... and provide insight into epigenetic-based regulation of sleep disturbances observed in neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's disease."

Pirooznia SK, Chiu K, Chan MT, Zimmerman JE, Elefant F. Epigenetic regulation of axonal growth of Drosophila pacemaker cells by histone acetyltransferase tip60 controls sleep. Genetics. 2012 Dec;192(4):1327-45. PMID: 22982579; PMCID: PMC3512142.

See also this post on a related paper from the same lab group.

Fly models & Alzheimers disease. Regulation of PAR-1. Recent report.

From the abstract:  "Our results provide new insights ... and offer new therapeutic strategies for diseases involving PAR-1/MARK deregulation."

Lee S, Wang JW, Yu W, Lu B. Phospho-dependent ubiquitination and degradation of PAR-1 regulates synaptic morphology and tau-mediated Aβ toxicity in Drosophila. Nat Commun. 2012;3:1312. PMID: 23271647.

Recent review: Fly models of fragile X syndrome

From the abstract: "Several clinical trials are in progress now that were motivated by this research."

McBride SM, Holloway SL, Jongens TA. Using Drosophila as a tool to identify Pharmacological Therapies for Fragile X Syndrome. Drug Discov Today Technol. 2012 Sep 24;10(1):e129-e136. PMID: 23730322.

Related blog posts include this one.

Fly models of ALS and frontotemporal lobar degeneration. Links to glutamate transport. Recent report.

Diaper DC, Adachi Y, Lazarou L, Greenstein M, Simoes FA, Di Domenico A, Solomon DA, Lowe S, Alsubaie R, Cheng D, Buckley S, Humphrey DM, Shaw CE, Hirth F. Drosophila TDP-43 dysfunction in glia and muscle cells cause cytological and behavioral phenotypes that characterize ALS and FTLD. Hum Mol Genet. 2013 May 31. PMID: 23727833.

Using the fly to find genetic modifiers of polyglutamine-induced toxicity

VoSSfeldt H, Butzlaff M, PrüSSing K, Ní Chárthaigh RA, Karsten P, Lankes A, Hamm S, Simons M, Adryan B, Schulz JB, Voigt A. Large-scale screen for modifiers of ataxin-3-derived polyglutamine-induced toxicity in Drosophila. PLoS One. 2012;7(11):e47452. PMID: 23139745; PMCID: PMC3489908.

Recent review: Flies as a model to study aging.

Brandt A, Vilcinskas A. The Fruit Fly Drosophila melanogaster as a Model for Aging Research. Adv Biochem Eng Biotechnol. 2013 Apr 19. PMID: 23604209.

New fly model of mitochondrial diseases related to tRNA synthetases

Guitart T, Picchioni D, Piñeyro D, Ribas de Pouplana L. Human mitochondrial disease-like symptoms caused by a reduced tRNA aminoacylation activity in flies. Nucleic Acids Res. 2013 May 15. PMID: 23677612.

Mammalian Itpr1 can provide function in IP(3)R mutant flies. Recent report related to spinocerebellar ataxia.

Chakraborty S, Hasan G. Functional complementation of Drosophila itpr mutants by rat Itpr1. J Neurogenet. 2012 Sep;26(3-4):328-37. PMID: 22817477.

Flies, sugar and heart disease. Recent report.

Not all fly models of disease start with a genetic mutation or disruption. Some start with a treatment or nutritional change--in this case, a high-sugar diet.

Na J, Musselman LP, Pendse J, Baranski TJ, Bodmer R, Ocorr K, Cagan R. A Drosophila model of high sugar diet-induced cardiomyopathy. PLoS Genet. 2013;9(1):e1003175. PMID: 23326243; PMCID: PMC3542070.

From the abstract:  "Our data establish Drosophila as a useful system for exploring specific aspects of diet-induced heart dysfunction and emphasize enzymes within the hexosamine biosynthetic pathway as candidate therapeutic targets."