Motte Rimrock Reserve

08 Aug, 08 AM - 10 Aug, 05 AM

Research Purpose? The maintenance of water balance in humans is one of the most important physiologic processes. Indeed, humans and most other mammals are exquisitely sensitive to changes in osmolality, with slight derangement eliciting physiologic compromise. When the loss of water exceeds dietary intake, dehydration occurs. Dehydration is an important source of morality, and can lead secondarily to several common clinical conditions including Acute Kidney Injury (AKI) and End-Stage Renal Failure (ESRD). Unlike most mammals, animals living in desert habitats are subjected to long periods during which no source of extrinsic water is available. As a result, animals living in these environments have evolved mechanisms through which physiologic homeostasis is maintained despite severe and prolonged dehydration. A better understanding of the mechanisms allowing desert-adapted mammals to survive without water intake is directly relevant to human health, with new insights providing fodder for the development of novel strategies aimed at the treatments and prevention of conditions caused by, or associated with, dehydration. Because dehydration can lead to kidney disease, (which affects millions of people (USRDS 2010)), finding effective strategies for its treatment and prevention is urgently needed. Here, I propose to study the genomic underpinnings of functional anuria, an adaptation to the absence of extrinsic water in desert-adapted rodents? using a comparative approach at the intra- and inter-specific levels. This study has important implications for human health and medicine, as uncovering the genetic mechanisms underlying desert-adapted rodents unique ability to tolerate dehydration will broaden our understanding of why humans can?t. Experimental Design & Methods? The project proposed here will use Illumina sequencing (Illumina, San Diego, CA. USA) of tissue-specific mRNA molecules to better understand the genomic mechanisms underlying anuria in desert rodents. RNAseq experiments offer three main benefits over traditional array-based experiments ('t Hoen et al. 2008). First, no a priori knowledge of the genes underlying phenotypic differences is required (Gilad et al. 2009). This is especially important in non-model organisms, because it opens up the possibility for the identification of novel genes. Second, because the number of reads matching a given genomic region is directly related to transcript abundance, very small, yet biologically relevant differences are detectable. (Mortazavi et al. 2008) Lastly, the presence of alternative spicing events that can lead to different phenotypes can be discovered (Nagalakshmi et al. 2008; Sultan et al. 2008). For aim 1, five individuals per population per season of P. eremicus and maniculatus will be collected. Sympatry of P. eremicus and maniculatus species is common in Southern California. Each population will be sampled twice, once during the summer? a minimum of six weeks after the last rainfall, and once at the end of the wet season, when water is maximally available. Animals will be live trapped and humanely euthanized. Within minutes of death, one kidney, the pituitary and the hypothalamus will be removed, and immediately placed in RNAlater and preserved. All procedures will be approved by the University of California, Berkeley Animal Care and Use Committee and are in accord with the guidelines of the American Society of Mammalogists (Gannon and Sikes 2007).

Visit #25872 @Motte Rimrock Reserve

Approved

Under Project # 23999 | Research

Genomics of Physiologic Water Conservation

research_scientist - University of California, Berkeley

Reservation Members(s)

Matthew MacManes Aug 8 - 10, 2011 (3 days)

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Motte Bunk House 1 Aug 8 - 10, 2011