Recent review--immune responses

This review appears to have a particular focus on the use of RNAi screening to study Drosophila immune responses.

Valanne S. Functional genomic analysis of the Drosophila immune response. Dev Comp Immunol. 2013 May 21. PMID: 23707784.

Breaking report--using mass spec to look at in vivo fly RNAi knockdown

Glukhova VA, Tomazela DM, Findlay GD, Monnat RJ, Maccoss MJ. Rapid assessment of  RNAi-mediated protein depletion by selected reaction monitoring (SRM) mass spectrometry. J Proteome Res. 2013 May 28. PMID: 23713831.

Recent review--RNAi and viral defense

Karlikow M, Goic B, Saleh MC. RNAi and antiviral defense in Drosophila: Setting up a systemic immune response. Dev Comp Immunol. 2013 May 14. PMID: 23684730.

CRISPR technology in flies

Of course this is not RNAi but it's the kind of technology we like to keep aware of here at the DRSC. So I thought I'd share it on the blog.

Gratz SJ, Cummings AM, Nguyen JN, Hamm DC, Donohue LK, Harrison MM, Wildonger J, O'Connor-Giles KM. Genome engineering of Drosophila with the CRISPR RNA-guided Cas9 nuclease. Genetics. 2013 May 24. PMID: 23709638.

Breaking report--piRNA Pathway

These authors used an in vivo RNAi screen in the fly ovary to interrogate the piRNA pathway.

Handler D, Meixner K, Pizka M, Lauss K, Schmied C, Gruber FS, Brennecke J. The Genetic Makeup of the Drosophila piRNA Pathway. Mol Cell. 2013 May 9. PMID: 23665231

New disease-relevant cell-based assay--Yersinia enterocolitica

These authors took advantage of the growth temperature of Drosophila cultured cells to establish a cell model for the GI pathogen Y. enterocolitica.

Walker KA, Maltez V, Hall JD, Vitko NP, Miller VL. A Phenotype at Last: Essential Role for the Yersinia enterocolitica Ysa Type III Secretion System in a Drosophila S2 cell model. Infect Immun. 2013 Apr 29. PMID: 23630961.