Columbia University in the City of New York

Mar 18, 202510:30 am
Seminar

Local Circuits - Laura B. Duvall

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March 18th, 10:30 am – 11:30 am at the Jerome L. Greene Science Center (Kavli Auditorium, 9th floor Lecture Hall)

Laura B. Duvall, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Biological Sciences

Columbia University

 

Host(s): Carol Mason (Faculty)

 

Neuropeptide regulation of blood feeding in mosquitoes

 

My research group uses genetic and pharmacological approaches to identify the genes, signaling pathways, and circuits that regulate host-seeking and biting in Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. Hardwired circuits provide a structure for behavior, for example by encoding responses to sensory cues emitted by human hosts, and neuromodulators shape and specify when and how innate behaviors are performed. The drive to find and bite humans is not constitutive, but is regulated by the female mosquito’s internal state as well as environmental cues. We have identified neuropeptide signaling pathways that regulate host-seeking behavior after a blood meal and by time of day. Aedes aegypti females normally suppress their host-seeking drive after a complete blood meal, while eggs are developing. We identified a hindgut-expressed Neuropeptide Y-like receptor (NPYLR7) that coordinates host-seeking suppression, egg development, and nutrient utilization after a blood meal. Pharmacological or genetic disruption of this pathway leads to inappropriate attraction to human host cues, while exogenous activation of this pathway suppresses host attraction even in the absence of a nutritive blood meal. The temporal organization of biting activity varies between mosquito species and Aedes aegypti show the highest levels of biting near dawn and dusk. We show that Aedes aegypti change their behavioral responses to CO2, a potent host-associated chemosensory cue, at different times of the day. The circadian neuropeptide Pigment Dispersing Factor (PDF) is a critical regulator of daily activity and disrupting PDF signaling alters the temporal organization of daily activity and host cue responsiveness. Beyond the significance of this work to basic neuroscience discovery, these behaviors play key roles in vector biology and our work can provide new targets to prevent the mosquito/host interactions that contribute to disease transmission.

 

Relevant Publications:

Circadian modulation of mosquito host-seeking persistence by Pigment-Dispersing Factor impacts daily biting patterns

Small-Molecule Agonists of Ae. aegypti Neuropeptide Y Receptor Block Mosquito Biting

 

Venue Information:

Speaker Location: Jerome L. Greene Science Center, Kavli Auditorium, 9th Floor Lecture Hall

 

Tuesdays@10 is a signature Zuckerman Institute initiative that aims to expose researchers at all levels to high-quality science and stimulate scientific discourse. The speakers featured in this series represent various fields and techniques in neuroscience, and include invited guests of the Columbia Neuroscience Seminars, the Zuckerman Institute's Local Circuits Affiliates Program, and other special seminar series through a combined, collaborative effort of one or more of the following: Columbia's Zuckerman Institute, the Center for Precision Psychiatry, the Department of Neuroscience, the Doctoral Program in Neurobiology and Behavior and the Columbia Translational Neuroscience Initiative, and with support from the Kavli Institute for Brain Science

 

More information and a full schedule can be found here.

 

Venue: the Jerome L. Greene Science Center (Kavli Auditorium, 9th floor Lecture Hall)
3227 Broadway, New York, NY, 10027

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