Friday, April 18th undergraduates presented their research at the Spring 2025 Intersections. Zion Tasew, an undergraduate studying in Dr. Nicole Crown’s lab was awarded first place for his presentation “RNAi Screen of Candidate Proteins Related to Meiotic DSB Protein, Vilya, In D. melanogaster.”

For a short project description: This project’s goal is to discover more proteins possibly interacting with Vilya, a meiotic double-stranded break (DSB) protein shown to be required for the formation of DSB’s that will be resolved into crossovers. I have used RNAi to systematically knockdown candidate proteins possibly related to Vilya (with high confidence), then analyzed phenotypes using immunofluorescence confocal imaging and Non-disjunction Scoring (%NDJ). Phenotypes indicative of a failure of the meiotic DSB and crossover formation program demonstrate the possible importance of a protein to the meiotic program.

Congratulations Zion!

Zion Tasew standing in front of his poster presentation.