This action funds an NSF Minority Postdoctoral Research Fellowship for 1996. This fellowship supports research and training in the area of developmental biology. The research and training plan addresses the sperm components required for sperm-oocyte interactions in C. elegans, an important model system used extensively in studies of normal development. The project uses several genes that when mutated produce cytologically normal and motile sperm that cannot fertilize oocytes even after contact. These mutations seem to disrupt either sperm-oocyte recognition, adhesion, or fusion. Equivalent mutants have not been described in any other metazoan. The approaches include genetic, cell biological, and molecular biological ones to gain an understanding of these genes and their mutant forms.
