Featuring:

Daniela Drummond-Barbosa, PhD

Title: Stem cells, diet, and physiology

 

Nutrient availability has well documented effects on tissue stem cell lineages in a wide range of multicellular organisms; yet, the molecular, cellular and physiological mechanisms underpinning stem cell control by diet, metabolism or hormones in vivo remains largely unexplored. Dr. Drummond-Barbosa pioneered using Drosophila to study adult stem cell regulation by diet. She showed that ovarian stem cells and their descendants proliferate and grow faster on rich relative to poor diets. Her laboratory subsequently played a major role in delineating how insulin-like peptides, ecdysone, and the Target of Rapamycin (TOR) nutrient sensor mediate this response by acting in the ovary. More recently, Dr. Drummond-Barbosa’s research program has been addressing the link between adipocyte physiology and stem cell biology. This question is particularly relevant to the current obesity epidemic and to the poorly understood connection between obesity and cancers.