{"id":11779,"date":"2017-12-05T16:58:01","date_gmt":"2017-12-05T15:58:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.embl.de\/?p=11779"},"modified":"2024-03-22T11:52:46","modified_gmt":"2024-03-22T10:52:46","slug":"behind-scenes-fly-room","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/lab-matters\/behind-scenes-fly-room\/","title":{"rendered":"Behind the scenes in the Fly Room"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

One of the most intriguingly named rooms at EMBL in Heidelberg is the Fly Room. Inside, all of one wall and most of another are filled with shelf upon shelf of vials, each containing Drosophila melanogaster<\/em> \u2013 the common fruit fly. Alongside the shelves are a series of workstations equipped with microscopes and paintbrushes. Seated at one of these workstations, EMBL staff scientist Imre Gaspar<\/a> takes a vial of flies and a handheld instrument that looks like a smaller version of the nozzle you use to fill your car with petrol. Instead of dispensing fuel, however, this nozzle emits carbon dioxide. Gaspar slides it past the cotton wool stopper on the vial and uses it to anaesthetise the flies inside, so he can study them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis used to be done with anaesthetics like ether,\u201d says Gaspar. \u201cI\u2019ve used ether on flies in the past but after a while it can make you feel dizzy, so carbon dioxide is a better choice. It temporarily anaesthetises the flies, so they lay motionless under the microscope. You can then use a paintbrush to sort the flies according to whether they have the characteristics you want.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Working with flies<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"Staff
Staff scientist Imre Gaspar examines fly specimens. PHOTO: Marietta Schupp\/EMBL<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

If researchers want to understand what a particular gene does, they often need to study a fly strain that\u2019s missing a copy of that gene, or has a mutation in it. Usually this won\u2019t cause any visible change to the fly, so changes to the fly\u2019s genome are made with an associated marker gene that does have a visible effect. There are various commonly used marker genes, including ones that produce white eyes (fruit flies normally have red eyes), notches in the ends of the wings, or wings that curl upwards, away from the body. The sorting process with a microscope and paintbrush can therefore be carried out by looking for these changes in the flies. The selected flies can then be studied, or crossed with other flies to create a new strain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These fly strains are used by many research groups at EMBL, most often to understand aspects of fly embryo development, which is coordinated by a precise sequence of interactions between parts of the fly\u2019s genome and its associated proteins. While flies might seem far removed from humans, the process of embryonic development is similar across the animal kingdom, and many other fundamental cellular processes are similar too. Research on flies can therefore provide important insights<\/a> into the way human embryos develop, and the way our cells behave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"After
After the flies have been anaesthetised with carbon dioxide, a paintbrush is used to sort them under the microscope. PHOTO: Marietta Schupp\/EMBL<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Because of this close link to development, the Fly Room is located in and run by the Developmental Biology unit at EMBL<\/a>, but the flies that are bred here are used by fly researchers across EMBL.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fundamentals of flykeeping<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

One important aspect of looking after flies is giving them the right food. In another part of the building, EMBL has a Fly Kitchen with dedicated staff responsible for fly food preparation. \u201cApart from some antibacterial compounds, most of the ingredients for the fly food are things you can buy in an ordinary grocery store,\u201d explains Gaspar. \u201cThings like yeast, malt extract, and apple juice. These are then mixed with agar and poured into vials, so the food turns into a gel as it cools. The vial is then ready to house and feed a new set of flies.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Most ingredients for the fly food are things you can buy in an ordinary grocery store<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Other important considerations are temperature and humidity. Ensuring that these are carefully controlled is one of the responsibilities of lab manager Anna Cyrklaff<\/a>, who has run EMBL\u2019s fly facility for almost twenty years. Aside from the main Fly Room, EMBL has several fly stock rooms that need to be kept at different temperatures \u2013 some at 18 \u00b0C, others at room temperature (around 21 \u00b0C), and others at 25 \u00b0C. \u201cStocks that are less important can be kept at 18 \u00b0C,\u201d explains Cyrklaff. \u201cThey still survive but the time taken to produce each new generation of flies is longer and the stocks require less attention. On the other hand, fruit flies are most comfortable in the 25-degree room, which is close to their preferred temperature in the wild. There the generation time is around 10 days, so if you need to work as fast as possible, that\u2019s where your stocks should go.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The stock rooms need to have a humidity of around 50\u201360%. If it falls below that, flies lay fewer eggs and generally don\u2019t live as long. \u201cIn the summertime the humidity often gets too high, so we might have to add more agar to the fly food to absorb water,\u201d explains Cyrklaff. \u201cAnd in the winter it can get too low. Usually we deal with this by adjusting the climate control system in the stock rooms, but in extreme cases you can add water to the trays where the vials are stored, to bring the humidity back up.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Flipping flies<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Another requirement for looking after flies is regularly \u2018flipping\u2019 them into new vials. This ensures that they have fresh food and that their waste products don\u2019t build up inside the vial. Experienced practitioners like Cyrklaff and Gaspar are able to do this without allowing any flies to escape. They tap the vial on a table to make the flies fall down to the bottom, then quickly take out the stopper, tip the flies into a new vial, and put a stopper in it. This process needs to be repeated regularly \u2013 more often at higher temperatures where the flies are breeding more rapidly. At 18 \u00b0C it needs to be done every six weeks; at room temperature, every 20 days; and at 25 \u00b0C, around every 10 days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alongside the stocks of fruit flies that are kept in vials, Cyrklaff also regularly creates fruit fly population cages \u2013 larger containers holding many thousands of flies. These are used when EMBL researchers \u2013 whether in Heidelberg or at other sites \u2013 require large numbers of fly embryos to study.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You do feel a kind of pride when you see that a stock has produced many larvae<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Has working so closely with flies made Cyrklaff and Gaspar look any differently at flies outside the lab? \u201cBecause of their various mutations, our laboratory stocks tend to be much less resilient than flies in the wild. Sometimes it\u2019s very hard work to maintain them, so you do feel a kind of pride when you see that a stock has produced many larvae and they\u2019re looking healthy,\u201d explains Gaspar. \u201cBut that only applies in the lab. If I saw the same thing in my kitchen, I\u2019d be disgusted!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cyrklaff agrees. \u201cWe definitely don\u2019t enjoy breeding flies at home!\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Curious about what goes on in EMBL\u2019s Fly Room? Prepare to be a fly on the wall<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":11802,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,17593],"tags":[55,478,357,41,43,184],"embl_taxonomy":[],"class_list":["post-11779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lab-matters","category-people-perspectives","tag-development","tag-drosophila","tag-ephrussi","tag-genetics","tag-heidelberg","tag-model-organism"],"acf":{"article_intro":"

Curious about what goes on in EMBL\u2019s Fly Room? Prepare to be a fly on the wall<\/p>\n","related_links":[{"link_description":"What bizarre flies have taught us","link_url":"http:\/\/news.embl.de\/science\/what-we-learned-from-fruit-flies\/"},{"link_description":"More EMBL fruit fly research","link_url":"http:\/\/news.embl.de\/tag\/drosophila\/"},{"link_description":"Developmental Biology unit","link_url":"http:\/\/www.embl.de\/research\/units\/dev_biology\/index.html"}],"article_sources":false,"vf_locked":false,"featured":false,"color":"#007B53","show_featured_image":false,"source_article":false,"in_this_article":false,"press_contact":"None"},"embl_taxonomy_terms":[],"yoast_head":"\nBehind the scenes in the Fly Room | EMBL<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Lab manager Anna Cyrklaff and staff scientist Imre Gaspar discuss their work, and how the Fly Room helps researchers across EMBL.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link 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