Maria Paz Fernandez

Male CNS Connectome A team of researchers has unveiled the complete connectome of a male fruit fly central nervous system —a seamless map of all the neurons in the brain and nerve cord of a single male fruit fly and the ...

Exciting news for #drosophila #connectomics and #neuroscience enthusiasts: the Drosophila male central nervous system connectome is now live for exploration. Find out more at the landing page hosted by our Janelia FlyEM collaborators www.janelia.org/project-team....

Male CNS Connectome A team of researchers has unveiled the complete connectome of a male fruit fly central nervous system —a seamless map of all the neurons in the brain and nerve cord of a single male fruit fly and the ...

We're very proud to be releasing the complete male fly CNS connectome!

It's the product of a huge team effort here at Janelia in partnership with the Cambridge Fly Connectomics group (@jefferis.bsky.social and colleagues), plus invaluable collaborators.

More soon...
www.janelia.org/project-team...

Model organism databases face budget cuts and closures Beyond the crucial data they contain, these digital archives have provided an important space for academic communities to exchange ideas and resources.

Nature has published an article on the crisis facing MODs
Model organism databases face budget cuts and closures www.nature.com/articles/d41...
@zfinmod.bsky.social @xenbase.bsky.social @yeastgenome.bsky.social @mousegenome.bsky.social @ratgenome.bsky.social @geneontology.bsky.social @nature.com

FlyBase Update – October 2025 The termination of the NIH/NHGRI FlyBase grant has placed the long-term sustainability of FlyBase at risk. However, thanks to the generous support of several key individuals and institutions, we are pleased to announce that FlyBase will remain operational through the coming year. We extend our deepest gratitude to Yukiko Yamashita, Cassandra Extavour, Hugo Bellen, Thom Kaufman, the Genetics Society of America / Drosophila Board, the Bloomington Drosophila Stock Center, an anonymous donor and the Wellcome Trust. We are especially thankful for a generous gift from Seemay Chou, Jed McCaleb, and The Navigation Fund. We also greatly appreciate the continued support from the broader Drosophila community – your donations and service fees have been vital in helping us stay afloat. Special thanks also go to Jessica Manning for her tireless administrative work at Harvard, to Ruth Lehmann, Hugo Bellen, and Paul Sternberg for advice and efforts, and to the Board of the European Drosophila Society for all their efforts. Sadly, we must also share that several long-standing FlyBase team members have recently moved on. We are immensely grateful to Susan Russo-Gelbart, Lynn Crosby, Gil dos Santos, Kris Broll, Victoria Jenkins, and TyAnna Lovato for their many years of dedicated service and contributions to FlyBase. Looking ahead, ensuring FlyBase’s sustainability beyond the next year – and successfully integrating with the Alliance – will require new funding sources. We kindly ask for your continued support: • European labs: Please consider contributing to the Cambridge, U.K. FlyBase group • U.S. and other non-European labs: Please consider contributing to the U.S. FlyBase groups • Both U.K. and U.S. FlyBase are working diligently to establish an invoicing system. We appreciate your continued patience. For more information on how to support us, please visit: Contribute to FlyBase wiki page https://wiki.flybase.org/wiki/FlyBase:Contribute_to_FlyBase

There's an update on the state of FlyBase on the FlyBase.org front page. You can contribute to FlyBase at this link wiki.flybase.org/wiki/FlyBase...
We express enormous gratitude to the people, labs, groups, and foundations who have already helped us.
#FlyBase #Drosophila

Try explaining to them that your first name has four words.

Mitochondrial Complex I and ROS control neuromuscular function through opposing pre- and postsynaptic mechanisms How do neurons adapt to mitochondrial dysfunction in different tissues? This study shows that Mitochondrial Complex I depletion triggers ROS-driven compensatory signaling in motor neurons that preserv...

We have an uncorrected proof published for Bhagaban Mallik's study on Mitochondrial Complex I and how it regulates synapse function. You can find it in @plosbiology.org. I am so proud!

H/T collaborators: Drs. Sajad Bhat and Xinnan Wang @xinnanwanglab.bsky.social

journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...

Check out the new work from the Calvi lab ! #Drosophila #cellbio #polyploidy

@iubiology.bsky.social @briancalvi.bsky.social

Come join us!
Applications to the GCDB Biology Doctoral program at IU are due December 1st.

@iubiology.bsky.social
@alizeemalnoe.bsky.social @rhcalderon.bsky.social @lesleynweaver.bsky.social @hoosierflyman.bsky.social @tennessenlab.bsky.social @flyeyelab.bsky.social @briancalvi.bsky.social

San Juan Winter School on Connectomics and Brain Simulation Two-week intensive course on connectomics and brain simulation in San Juan, Puerto Rico. December 29, 2025 - January 10, 2026.

Applications are now open for our course on connectomics & brain simulation.
Organizers: Sven Dorkenwald (MIT), Stefanie Hampel (UPR), Andrew Seeds (UPR), Sebastian Seung (Princeton), and Srini Turaga (Janelia).
Interested? Apply here ➜ sjcabs.com

Professor Joel Levine Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada - Ecology & Evolutionary Biology The University of Toronto’s Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology is proud to announce that Professor Joel Levine has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC), the highest h...

Boom, congratulations Joel

A photo of a man at a conference table with a pitcher of margaritas in the middle, and a display screen showing a slide about Stephen Kuffler.

The neuroscience community has lost a dear friend and mentor. Ed Kravitz passed away on Sunday, September 21, 2025.

Here he is this past summer speaking with (and making margaritas for) the 2025 Grass Fellows, as he's done for more than two decades.

Rest in peace.

Thank you. Ed was a force of nature, and he will be missed.

Thank you, Tyler. He will be missed!

Ed Kravitz passed away yesterday.
He was a remarkable scientist and mentor- brilliant, curious, creative, and kind. I am grateful to have learned from him. His legacy will endure through his science and through the many people he inspired.

We will miss you, Ed.

I have gotten a bit behind at sharing the lab’s latest work - this paper is now published - check it out! www.cell.com/cell-reports... Long story short: insulin is the major determinant of female fat storage, with a relatively minor effect on males.

Join us! The Division of Invertebrate Zoology at the American Museum of Natural History is hiring a curatorial associate! For more information : careers.amnh.org/postings/4529

Gracias!

Green butterfly sat on a flower.

I'm looking for PhD students to join the lab starting August 2026. We study the evolution of insect chemical signals so if you're interested in evolutionary biology, chemical ecology, molecular biology, behavior, or genetics, this could be a good fit for you! More info here: tinyurl.com/mrxchwfm

Thank you!

Synaptic targets of circadian clock neurons influence core clock parameters A neuron type downstream of circadian pacemakers regulates daily sleep and activity timing in Drosophila.

New publication from our lab, in Science Advances:

Synaptic targets of circadian clock neurons influence core clock parameters

www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

New publication from our lab:
Sexually dimorphic and clock gene-specific effects of artificial light at night on Drosophila behavioral rhythms
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...

Confused writing is usually a symptom of confused thinking. As we struggle to clarify writing, we clarify our thoughts. AI writing aids rob us of that struggle, leaving clean-looking text and thoughts still confused for lack of inspection. Writing is not just a product; it is a diagnostic tool.

It takes less than a minute to donate to FlyBase—let’s support this essential resource for the Drosophila community.

Thanks, Shefali!

Adipocyte-Derived Amino Acid Storage Proteins are Required for Germline Stem Cell Maintenance in Adult Drosophila Females Tissue homeostasis is dependent on precise coordination between endocrine organs in response to changes in organism physiology. Secreted circulating factors from adipocytes (called adipokines) regulat...

My lab’s newest preprint is now available.

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Join us (and @sfn.org) this Wednesday for a webinar that will explore how brains cope with changing environments. Hear from experts on recent advances in the field.

Learn more: bit.ly/3HeL1kv

#KavliNeuro #neurosky @rosvall-lab.bsky.social

This short read is truly excellent - thank you, Martin Schwartz!

Flybase is free to use but not free to make. It takes large teams of people and millions of dollars a year to create the knowledgebas and tools for fly research. Please donate generously.

#Drosophila community in the US and non- EU countries, please donate to help us support #Flybase. People behind the scenes have put in incredible effort over the past few months - as someone who has seen some of it first hand at #IUBloomington, they deserve all the praise. Please share and donate !