Coastal Companion

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Evenings at Whitney Presents the Fruit Fly Fight Club

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The University of Florida Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience is pleased to present the next Evenings at Whitney public lecture titled “Genetic Manipulations in the Fruit Fly Fight Club: Love and War in a Single Gene and Other Stories.” This lecture will be presented on Thursday, April 10th, at 7:00 p.m. by Edward Kravitz, Ph.D. Dr. Kravitz, the George Packer Berry Professor of Neurobiology at Harvard Medical School, uses the fighting fruit fly model system to explore the neurobiology of aggression. While it may sound bizarre, Kravits work is serious.

“Aggression is a serious problem in society, but even after studies of lots of animal models for many years, we don’t know a lot about the biological basis of aggression,” Kravitz said. “We know that some chemicals like serotonin are very important, but beyond that, much remains to be discovered.”

Evenings at Whitney occur on the first or second Thursday of each month depending on the speaker. They are always held at 7:00 p.m. in the Whitney Lab’s Center for Marine Studies. Monthly presentations include current science topics, plus subjects from on-going research programs at the Whitney Lab. Speakers are recognized experts in their fields who welcome questions and discussion.

All lectures are free and open to the public. There is no charge for parking and reservations are not necessary.

Please visit www.whitney.ufl.edu for lecture schedules or contact the Whitney Lab at (904) 461-4000.

The Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience is a biomedical and biotechnology research institute of the University of Florida. It is made up of eleven different internal labs that use marine organisms for basic biological research that can be applied to human health, natural resources, and the environment. The Lab provides training for future experimental biologists, educational programs for kindergarten through university level students, and monthly lectures for the general public. It is located at 9505 Ocean Shore Blvd., St. Augustine, on the border of Flagler and St. Johns counties. To learn more about the Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience visit their website at www.whitney.ufl.edu.