Leung Lab Blog

I visited Ho Yu College in Hong Kong last month. A good mentor Dr. William Mak has been running a great biotechnology education program for the primary and secondary school students, as well as the public there. See an old post about their outreach program in which they fit a whole research lab into custom-built bus! I shared the research program of our laboratory at Purdue University on using zebrafish to screen drugs for vision benefit.

I outlined our approach on using simple visual behaviour assays to identify positive effects of drugs. I specifically emphasized on the potential to analyze many of traditional Chinese medicines; the treasure that we have been consuming for generations. Some of these possibilities are outlined in our recent review paper:

Zhang LY, Chong L, Cho J, Liao PC, Shen F, Leung YF. Drug Screening to Treat Early-Onset Eye Diseases: Can Zebrafish Expedite the Discovery? Asia-Pac J Ophthalmol 2012; 1:374-383. [Full text][pdf]

The interaction with the students was fantastic. They were very imaginative and eager to ask questions all the time! Their enthusiasm was infectious and is the driving force of scientific progress. That also reminded me of the problem of our education in stifling creativity when students are “educated”, which I wrote in a separate post recently.

This is truly an enjoyable experience and I look forward to visiting them again soon!

Development

1. Nancy P, Tagliani E, Tay CS, Asp P, Levy DE, Erlebacher A.  Chemokine gene silencing in decidual stromal cells limits T cell access to the maternal-fetal interface. Science. 2012 Jun 8;336(6086):1317-21. PubMed PMID: 22679098.
• News coverage: New Discovery Provides Insight on Long-Standing Pregnancy Mystery.

Behaviour

1. Polverino G, Abaid N, Kopman V, Macrì S, Porfiri M. Zebrafish response to robotic fish: preference experiments on isolated individuals and small shoals. Bioinspir Biomim. 2012 Jun 8;7(3):036019. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed PMID: 22677608.
• News coverage: Zebrafish Like their Robots Striped, Female and Fertile.

Systems Biology

1. Ku CJ, Wang Y, Weiner OD, Altschuler SJ, Wu LF. Network Crosstalk Dynamically Changes during Neutrophil Polarization. Cell. 2012 May 25;149(5):1073-83. PubMed PMID: 22632971.

Human Microbiome

1. Human Microbiome Project Consortium. Structure, function and diversity of the healthy human microbiome. Nature. 2012 Jun 13;486(7402):207-14. doi:10.1038/nature11234. PubMed PMID: 22699609.
2. Human Microbiome Project Consortium. A framework for human microbiome research. Nature. 2012 Jun 13;486(7402):215-21. doi: 10.1038/nature11209. PubMed PMID: 22699610.
• Commentary: Relman DA. Microbiology: Learning about who we are. Nature. 2012 Jun 13;486(7402):194-5. doi: 10.1038/486194a. PubMed PMID: 22699602.
• News coverage: Microbe census maps out human body’s bacteria, viruses, other bugs
• News coverage: Bacteria, viruses and fungi (oh my!) on the human body

Retinal degeneration

1. Taylor S, Chen J, Luo J, Hitchcock P. Light-induced photoreceptor degeneration in the retina of the zebrafish. Methods Mol Biol. 2012;884:247-54. PubMed PMID: 22688711.

Neuroscience

1. Cyranoski D. Neuroscience: The mind reader. Nature. 2012 Jun 13;486(7402):178-80. doi: 10.1038/486178a. PubMed PMID: 22699592.
2. Van Horn JD, Irimia A, Torgerson CM, Chambers MC, Kikinis R, Toga AW. Mapping connectivity damage in the case of phineas gage. PLoS One. 2012;7(5):e37454. Epub 2012 May 16. PubMed PMID: 22616011; PubMed Central PMCID: PMC3353935.
• News coverage: Phineas Gage’s connectome
• I wonder if mapping of the connectome can also help us understand how Derek Amato acquires his music talent after head injury.

Retinal development

1. Stacher Hörndli C, Chien CB. Sonic hedgehog is indirectly required for intraretinal axon pathfinding by regulating chemokine expression in the optic stalk. Development. 2012 Jun 13. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed PMID: 22696293.