Project Grant R01HD054354

This $355,123 federal Project Grant award from the National Science Foundation's Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074) supports research to genetically modify the immune system of the African clawed frog (Xenopus tropicalis) to improve its resistance to the deadly chytrid fungus. The goal is to identify how altering the frog's major histocompatibility complex (MHC) genes affects its ability to fight off this pathogen and survive infection. The project includes a sub-award to the University...

This three-year, $1 million Project Grant from the National Science Foundation's Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074) supports the development of viral vectors for gene delivery and manipulation in amphibian research. The Trustees of Columbia University will lead efforts to design new viral vectors with host specificity for amphibians. Researchers at Columbia, the Institute of Science and Technology Austria, the University of Utah, and the Scripps Research Institute will collaborate to test...

This $1,023,185 federal Project Grant award from the National Institutes of Health's Research Infrastructure Programs (CFDA 93.351) aims to expand conditional gene manipulation resources and precision genome editing tools for zebrafish research. The primary awardee, Iowa State University, will collaborate with researchers at the University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M AgriLife Research to achieve the following key objectives over the 4-year project period: Expand the community resource...

This Project Grant award of $743,926 from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) under the Research Infrastructure Programs (CFDA 93.351) will develop a resource of rigorously validated, translatable zebrafish models of previously undiagnosed human genetic diseases. The project will analyze genetic variants obtained from patients with rare, undiagnosed diseases through collaboration with clinical research consortia, and then generate humanized zebrafish models using CRISPR/Cas9 technology....

This Project Grant award from the National Institutes of Health's Office of Research Infrastructure Programs (CFDA 93.351) provides $194,375 to the University of Wisconsin - Madison to develop improved genome editing tools for creating conditional knockout and amino acid change mutations in zebrafish. The key objectives are to: Establish a reliable method for generating floxed alleles in zebrafish using a synthetic exon approach, enabling conditional gene knockouts. Expand the synthetic exon...

This $132,000 project grant from the U.S. Department of the Interior Fish and Wildlife Service Region 4, under the Candidate Species Conservation program (CFDA 15.660), will fund genetic analysis and population modeling to help inform conservation of the gopher frog (Lithobates capito). Tangled Bank Conservation will sequence thousands of genetic loci from 1,000 existing gopher frog samples across the species' range. They will assess phylogeographic structure, identify potential distinct...

This federal Project Grant award from the National Eye Institute (CFDA 93.867 - Vision Research) provides funding of $393,008 to the University of California, Davis to conduct research focused on understanding the mechanisms underlying successful axonal regeneration in the retinal ganglion cells of the frog Xenopus laevis. The key goals of this 5-year research project are to systematically dissect the intrinsic pathways involving the genes DLK and SARM1 that facilitate axon regeneration, as well...

This Project Grant award, funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) under the Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074), supports research on how the hormone aldosterone regulates amphibian metamorphosis from aquatic to terrestrial forms. The $629,995 award to the University of Cincinnati, with a performance period from September 2024 to August 2027, aims to reveal aldosterone's precise role in frog development by measuring corticosteroid levels, comparing wild-type and mutant tadpoles,...

The National Science Foundation awarded a $315,757 Project Grant to Simmons University under the Biological Sciences program (CFDA 47.074) for the period of April 1, 2021 through March 31, 2024. The grant aims to advance understanding of the developmental genetics underlying limb initiation in amphibians. Specifically, the university will conduct research to determine the cellular origins and molecular mechanisms that drive limb formation in metamorphosing frogs. Researchers will use...

This federal Project Grant award for $169,000.00, provided by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) under the Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research program (CFDA 93.865), supports the development of a single-cell reference atlas of axolotl embryogenesis. The overarching goal is to elucidate the fundamental biological processes required for limb regeneration, with the aim of informing future regenerative medicine strategies for human limb injuries...