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The zebrafish story celebrates the transformation that can happen at a university – a transformation replete with innovative new ideas replicated in the minds and lives of other people – the dogged persistence in pursuit of an understanding of life – the unselfish mentorship of students and fellow colleagues – and the raw excitement in the joy of discovery.”
—President Dave Frohnmayer
 Prior to the 1970s, zebrafish were simply just another popular aquarium fish. Since then, University of Oregon researchers have introduced these small vertebrates as important model organisms in biomedical research.
With the capability to regenerate fins, skin, and heart, zebrafish are prime subjects to test for mutations, which underlie genetic diseases that are common to both zebrafish and humans.
The chart below, inspired by the structure of a genetic linkage map, reflects this powerful network of UO faculty and alumni.
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In the early seventies, George Streisinger buys a zebrafish in a Portland pet store and is the first to use this tropical fish as a model system. |
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With 4,000 tanks and a staff of more than twenty, the UO zebrafish facility is home to more than 80,000 fish. |
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In 1981, Streisinger clones a zebrafish, leading to his seminal publication in Nature. |
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More than 9,000 scientific articles have been published to date using zebrafish as models in developmental and genetics research. Research has potential applications for everything from birth defects to leukemia, autism to cancer, or potentially any genetic disease, says Judith Eisen, director of the UO Institute of Neuroscience. |
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| In 1992, UO researcher Monte Westerfield creates the Zebrafish Information Network (ZFIN), an online database that disseminates information about zebrafish biology to researchers. |
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In 1997, the National Institute of Health establishes a special funding program to promote the use of zebrafish for the study of vertebrate development and disease throughout the nation. |
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In 1998, Westerfield and others begin to develop a central repository of wild-type and mutant strains of zebrafish at the Zebrafish International Resource Center. |
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Zebrafish are distributed for use in more than 500 developmental and genetics labs in thirty countries around the world. |
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In 1990, the UO hosts the first international conference on zebrafish to appraise the potential of research with this organism. |
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In 2006, UO alum Christine Beattie, a former postdoctoral fellow in Judith Eisen’s lab, serves as the main organizer for the 7th International Meeting on Zebrafish, where 915 participants from all over the world share their research. |
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| In 1994, John Postlethwait, professor in the Department of Biology, establishes the first map of the zebrafish genome, which helps researchers understand the functions of the tens of thousands of genes in the human genome. |
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The Wellcome Trust’s Sanger Center in the United Kingdom is using zebrafish from the UO to sequence the entire genome, a required step for understanding human biology and disease, says Westerfield: “Genetic model organisms, including zebrafish, play a critical role in this discovery process.” |
The Zebrafish Network
Judith Eisen Lab
Bruce Appel is now an associate professor of biological sciences at Vanderbilt and a Kennedy Center Investigator. Appel and a group of Vanderbilt researchers has successfully produced movies that provide the first direct view of the initial stage of the formation of myelin sheaths, which should aid in the design of new therapies to promote the repair of this protective layer following disease or injury.
Christine Beattie, assistant professor at Ohio State University, developed a zebrafish facility at OSU in early 1998 with fellow UO alumnus Paul Henion, and now uses zebrafish in her lab to model human motoneuron diseases such as Lou Gehrig’s disease. Beattie served as the main organizer for the 7th International Meeting on Zebrafish in 2006, where 915 participants from all over the world share their research.
Sarah Cheesman is currently a postdoctoral fellow in UO Assistant Professor Karen Guillemin’s lab, working on understanding the role of indigenous microbes in the formation and function of the gastrointestinal tract in zebrafish.
Robert Cornell received tenure at the University of Iowa, where his lab works to improve the ability of clinicians to diagnose and treat developmental disorders.
Sarah Hutchinson is currently a postdoctoral fellow at Trede Lab in Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah, where she studies how defects in the development of T cells and the thymus leads to diseases such as leukemia, autoimmunity and immunodeficiency.
Robert Kelsh, professor in the Department of Biology and Biochemistry at the University of Bath is interested in fundamental questions in developmental biology concerning zebrafish neural crest development, which has important medical implications for certain human syndromes, including Waardenburg-Shah syndrome and Hirschsprung’s disease.
Katharine Lewis, research fellow in the department of physiology, development and neuroscience at the University of Cambridge is interested in investigating which regulatory genes are expressed by specific interneurons and what the roles of these regulatory genes are in determining different neuronal characteristics, using zebrafish as a model system.
David Raible is now an associate professor at the University of Washington, where his lab continues to use zebrafish to study the development of the nervous system. In addition, his lab is looking at the genetic basis underlying loss of mechanosensory hair cells, the leading cause of human hearing and balance disorders.
Charles Kimmel Lab
Cecilia Moens, an investigator for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and associate member of the Division of Basic Sciences at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, researches the genetic basis of development of zebrafish in her lab and how genes control the early development of the brain.
For complete list of Kimmel Lab alumni, please visit http://www.neuro.uoregon.edu/kimmel/rogues.html
John Postlethwait Lab
Bernard and Christine Thisse, internationally renowned for their work in embryonic research and genetics, use zebrafish to examine regenerative medicine and stem cell biology, which has potential applications for the prevention and treatment of birth defects and cancer. The couple built a research program at the Institute of Genetic and Molecular Cell Biology in France and will join the University of Virginia School of Medicine faculty in August 2007.
Monte Westerfield Lab
Adam Felsenfeld now serves as an extramural program director for the National Human Genome Research Institute, has participated in the trans-NIH initiative for genomic tools for the zebrafish, and has worked to develop large-scale genome sequencing centers, which have contributed the US component of the International Human Genome Project.
Robert Ho, associate professor in the department of organismal biology and anatomy at the University of Chicago addresses classical problems of vertebrate embryogenesis using modern techniques in the zebrafish embryo with the general goal to gain insights into the cellular, molecular and genetic mechanisms leading to the assignment of cell fate and, ultimately, to the formation of a complex vertebrate body plan.
Dennis Liu, senior program officer of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, administers pre-college science education initiatives, which fund outreach programs at museums and medical schools aimed at reaching teachers, students and families. Liu also developed and manages an educational website that features animations and virtual labs on biomedical science to a general audience.
Stephan Neuhauss, professor in the department of biology and brain research institute at the University of Zurich, created a complete zebrafish genetic linkage map in 1988 with fellow researchers. The markers provide an initial infrastructure for the positional cloning of the nearly 600 zebrafish genes identified as crucial to vertebrate development, and will become the anchor for the physical map of the zebrafish genome.
For a complete list of Westerfield lab alumni please visit http://www.neuro.uoregon.edu/westerf/alumni.html
James Weston Lab
Paul Henion, associate professor in the Center for Molecular Neurobiology at Ohio State University, developed a zebrafish facility there in early 1998 with fellow UO alum Christine Beattie. Henion’s lab focuses on developmental biology, with implications for novel diagnostic and treatment strategies for relatively common birth defects and diseases in humans.
Steve Johnson, associate professor in the department of genetics at Washington University in St. Louis, now serves on the UO’s ZFIN advisory board. Johnson was responsible for working out the first mapping protocols and his lab is interested in how animals grow, maintain and generate their form or the diseases consequent to abnormal growth control such as cancer using zebrafish.
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