The Mesce Lab

They say that the only thing that’s constant in the world is change, and that seems to be the case for us too! With the end of summer on the horizon, it was time to bid a fond farewell to lab manager Tony Bigelow, who recently left the lab to pursue a Ph.D. in Neuroscience at the University of Washington in Seattle. Tony joined the lab in early 2015 as an undergraduate researcher, and upon graduating in 2016, assumed the role of lab manager. During his time in the lab, Tony made some incredible discoveries that have helped illuminate possible mechanisms by which leeches recover their locomotory abilities following traumatic nerve cord injury, and his findings will form a crucial component of our upcoming publication on the phenomenon. We are sad to see Tony go, but we know that many great things await him as he starts his new journey, and we are excited to hear about all of his future successes!

We are also happy to welcome Ph.D. student Carrie Sheeler into the lab! Carrie is a first year student in the Graduate Program in Neuroscience, who will be completing a lab rotation with us this fall. Though she will only be with us for several months, we are looking forward to working with her in the lab. Welcome, Carrie!

And last, but certainly not least, we would like to join the rest of the Entomology Department in welcoming our new Department Head, Dr. Sujaya Rao, who will be arriving in Minnesota later this month. Sujaya is an alumna of the department, and upon graduating with her Ph.D., completed a postdoc in our lab in 1992. We are excited to have her back with us, and look forward to working with her to create a bright new future for the department.

Undergraduate researcher Maria Godinez gave a wonderful poster presentation of her summer project at the Multicultural Summer Research Opportunities Program (MSROP) Research Symposium yesterday. Maria’s poster highlighted some of her preliminary findings on the responses of different mechanosensory neurons in injured leeches before and after recovery, a project that she hopes to continue working on in the upcoming semester. Way to go, Maria!

Can you believe that it’s already been a full year since our lab hosted a Bugs ’n Brews (Entomology Social Hour) and turned Hodson Hall into a 1920s speakeasy? Well, the time has come for us to host Bugs ’n Brews again, and this time… we want to see what you got! That’s why the Mesce Lab is pleased to present Entomology’s Got Talent: the first-ever Entomology Department talent show! That’s right— in addition to all of the usual refreshments & comeraderie you’ve come to love from Bugs ’n Brews, this time there will also be an optional talent competition! So, come strut your stuff! We even have a few prizes for the very best acts….

It’s going to be so much fun, and we look forward to seeing all of our friends and colleagues in the Entomology Department there! The festivities will take place this Friday (August 4th), from 4-6pm in Hodson Hall 490. We hope that you can make it!

We are happy to announce that Ph.D. candidate Anthony Auletta has been named a recipient of the CFANS Alumni Society Graduate Student Professional Development Award! This award, offered through the Alumni Society of the College of Food, Agriculture, and Natural Resource Sciences (CFANS), comes with $500 to use towards travel or professional skill-building activities. Anthony plans to use the award to attend the 2017 Annual Meeting of the Entomological Society of America (ESA), which is being held this November in Denver, CO. Congratulations, Anthony!

We have a new publication to report! PI Dr. Karen Mesce is a co-author on a new paper that was published in Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience earlier this month. The paper, A tyrosine-hydroxylase characterization of dopaminergic neurons in the honey bee brain, was written in collaboration with Dr. Martin Giurfa and colleagues at Université de Toulouse in France.

Karen has been busy as a bee (ha— get it?) working on this paper over the last few months, so we are very excited that it is now published and available for reading! Congratulations, Karen! The full citation is below— please take a look:

Tedjakumala SR, Rouquette J, Boizeau ML, Mesce KA, Hotier L, Massou I, Giurfa M. 2017. A tyrosine-hydroxylase characterization of dopaminergic neurons in the honey bee brain. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience 11:47. PubMed Link