This award will provide supplementary support to enable Dr. Dorothy Rountree of Duke University to conduct collaborative research with Dr. Sho Sakurai for 12 months at Kanazawa University in Japan. Rountree and Sakurai will utilize Rountree's expertise in molecular endocrinology to investigate ketoreductase and its role in regulating insect physiology and development. Insects are encased by a chitinous exoskeleton which is shed or molted when the insects grow. This molting process is controlled by a family of steroid hormones known as ecdysteroids. Synthesis of these ecdysteroids in the insect's prothoracic glands is triggered by the release of a prothoracicotropic hormone (PTTH), ecdysone, from the insect's brain. Recently another ecdysteroid, 3-dehydro-ecdysone, was discovered to be the PTTH secreted by some insects. This PTTH is reduced to ecdysone by an enzyme, ketoreductase. Dr. Sakurai is currently the world's premier investigator of ketoreductase and Dr. Rountree's experience with molecular and endocrine techniques will facilitate the study of ketoreductase at the molecular and genetic level, providing information on the enzyme's vital regulatory role in insect development.
