Studying the role of the cytoskeleton in zebrafish optic nerve development in an undergraduate neuroscience course — Presentation Detail — Celebration of Scholars

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Student presentations must have a faculty sponsor.

Abstracts must include a title and a description of the research, scholarship, or creative work. The description should be 150-225 words in length and constructed in a format or style appropriate for the presenter’s discipline.

The following points should be addressed within the selected format or style for the abstract:

A clear statement of the problem or question you pursued, or the scholarly goal or creative theme achieved in your work.
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Additional Information

More information is available at carthage.edu/celebration-scholars/. The following are members of the Research, Scholarship, and Creativity Committee who are eager to listen to ideas and answer questions:

Jun Wang
Kim Instenes
John Kirk
Nora Nickels
Andrew Pustina
James Ripley

Studying the role of the cytoskeleton in zebrafish optic nerve development in an undergraduate neuroscience course

Name: Megan Coy
Major: Neuroscience
Hometown: Portage
Faculty Sponsor: Steven Henle
Other Sponsors:
Type of research: Independent research
Funding: NIH-NEI grant

Abstract

Though much is known about the external signaling cues that guide growing axons, the intracellular process is less clear. However, cytoskeletal dynamics are essential for the control of cell shape, movement, and axon guidance. Zebrafish are great models for studying the optic nerve because their optic nerve can be observed as it develops and regenerates with transgenic reporters (Isl2b:GFP) and antibodies.It is also known that actin filaments play an important role in neuronal migration and different inhibitors can show the effects of cellular processes on axonal migration when the actin is affected. Axon guidance and the assembly of the cytoskeleton on the generation of the optic nerve in Zebrafish can be studied using cytoskeletal inhibitors. Through the use of confocal microscopy and improving staining techniques the development of the optic nerve can be tracked at varying time points. Inhibitors such as Latrunculin B (latB), Blebbistatin, and Jasplakinolide (Jasp) affected and altered the growth of the optic nerve. The use of antibodies, ZN-5 and a chicken antibody that targets GFP, paired with a clearing technique were explored to improve the imaging of the optic nerve within Zebrafish. This study is funded and supported by Carthage College Department of Neuroscience and funded by NIH-NEI grant R00EY027467.