Posts Tagged Department of Biology

I’m an only child, and my mother and I moved around quite a bit when I was growing up. We lived in three different countries. I was born in Lexington,…

The common fruit fly is often deemed an annoying household pest. But these tiny insects are a boon to researchers. Rochester biologist John Jaenike has co-authored the first comprehensive guide to fruit flies published in nearly a century.

Biologist Amanda Larracuente and her team are the first to successfully sequence the firefly genome.

Researchers have identified a protein that is required for cell death after undergoing chemotherapy—at least, it appears, in male mice.

Colleagues and former students remember the long-time biology professor and one of the world’s leading authorities on pseudoscorpions. Muchmore discovered and named more than 290 new species of the small arachnids in his 40-year career.

University researchers studying the venom of parasitic wasps believe a relatively understudied mechanism for creating new gene functions may be widespread in other species as well.

Students from Rochester’s East High School got a sense of how startling science can be when they spent the day in the lab with professors and researchers from the Department of Biology.

Drosophila melanogaster—the common fruit fly—is widely used in laboratory experiments. But what Rochester researchers found when examining the guts of fruit flies in the wild bears little resemblance to what is seen in the lab.

There are many examples of DNA damage being associated with aging, but never has a reduction in DNA damage been shown to extend lifespan. Rochester research has made this connection, and identified an enzyme that can be targeted to reduce that damage.

Researchers who specialize in the study of aging have identified a protein that may serve as a first responder, activating a “longevity gene” known as sirtuin 6 and setting in motion a cascade of molecular first responders to repair damaged DNA.