The roundworm C. elegans is one of the most widely studied and powerful genetic model organisms in biology. Many experiments in C. elegans genetics require time-consuming and low throughput manual procedures. For example, the forward genetic screen, through which genes influencing a phenotype are found by identification of mutants, often involves assessment of tens of thousands of individual animals. Full exploitation of C. elegans as a model system will benefit tremendously from automation. We will develop automated methods for performing genetic screens and many other tasks routinely done in C. elegans labs. The key components of the system will be a moving-camera machine vision system for monitoring individual worms on various substrates, and a robotic arm capable of transferring individual worms from one plate to another. To test and refine our methods, we will apply our automation system to perform a saturation genetic screen for modifiers of developmentally-timed sleep, which has molecular and behavioral similarities to sleep in mammals.
The study of model organisms like the roundworm C. elegans has been critical to our understanding of diverse biological phenomena including cell death, aging, and sleep. Our research will develop an automated tool for measuring and manipulating C. elegans and use it to discover genes responsible for sleep.
