C. Model Organisms Core
The Joseph P. Kennedy Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research CenterCenter URL: http://iddrc.uchicago.edu/
Core URL: http://mrddrc.bsd.uchicago.edu/Core%20C.html
Core Personnel
Core Director: Elizabeth Grove, Ph.D.
Core Associate Director: Robert Ho, Ph.D.
Core Associate Director: Clifton Ragsdale, Ph.D.
Core Staff: Linda Degenstein
Core Staff: Miriam Domowicz, Ph.D.
This Core provides services for modification of gene expression in three animal models: mouse, zebrafish and chicken. It thus allows investigators to make use of multiple model systems to address neurological questions, taking advantage of the unique features of each system. The availability of a shared facility enables investigators to make more rapid and significant progress without incurring the expenses of establishing multiple systems within individual laboratories. As well, investigators have access to an array of expertise, project advice and technology. Each Subcore is designed to provide the expertise to take projects from idea through execution and initial data analysis.
Sub Core C1: Mouse Genetic Services
Mouse Genetic Services are offered via the BSD Transgenic/ES Cell Technology Mouse Core. MRDD members receive a discount on the services provided by this core. These services include the production of transgenic mice from nuclear injection through the F1 progeny stage, and Embryonic Stem Cell technology ranging from gene targeting through injection of blastocysts for chimera production and subsequent breeding.
Sub Core C2: Zebrafish Services
Subcore C2 allows investigators, including those whose research has focused on mouse or other amniote models, to exploit easily the advantages of the zebrafish. The Subcore offers consultation and experimental services to allow users to investigate gene function and gene regulation in zebrafish embryos. Techniques are well established in zebrafish for testing gene function by antisense morpholino knockdown or by mRNA misexpression, and to investigate gene regulation using reporter constructs in transgenic animals. The zebrafish embryo is particularly well suited to imaging approaches: the embryos are small enough to allow observation of the entire specimen under a compound or confocal microscope, their optical clarity allows easy observation of fluorescent reporters (such as GFP) in live specimens, and their rapid development facilitates use of time-lapse microscopy to follow cell movements in real time. Genetic manipulations of zebrafish embryos can be coupled with imaging approaches and with behavioral techniques to allow gene function to be assessed not only on the cellular level but also at the organismal level. This Subcore aims to provide services both for IDDRC investigators who want to begin a significant program of zebrafish research in their labs, and IDDRC investigators who want to take advantage of the zebrafish system in a pilot study to rapidly test the effects of a specific genetic manipulation in preparation for more time-consuming mouse genetics
Sub Core C3: Chick Embryo Services
This core offers training and oversight to IDD laboratories in chicken in ovo electroporation techniques and also provides facilities for carrying out in ovo electroporation experiments. The Chick Embryo Services Core offers expertise to help IDDRC researchers identify chicken homologs of genes of interest and design expression vectors to introduce and express genetic constructs of interest, or to knock down target-mRNA expression by RNAi methodology.
The chicken embryo is a major model system in vertebrate developmental biology. Its classical strengths are the accessibility and hardiness of the embryo, which have underlain its success as a key preparation for experimental embryology. In the last ten years, chick developmental biology has moved fully into the modern molecular genetic mainstream with the releases of chicken EST and genome databases and the development of direct electroporation as an efficient method of chick embryo transgenesis. The goal of the Chick Electroporation Core is to allow IDDRC researchers take advantage of the chick embryo model system for the rapid assessment of gene function in neural development.
Last Edited: 05/04/11 12:00 AM by Miriam Domowicz
