Measuring Drosophila (fruit fly) activity during microgravity exposure.

Important advances in the understanding of the aging process could be obtained through comprehension of the changes experienced by Drosophila melanogaster (fruit flies) during microgravity. Previous experiments flown on Cosmos satellites and various Space Shuttle missions have shown a significant decrease in the life span of young male Drosophila after microgravity exposure. Additionally, postflight analysis indicated an accelerated aging of the microgravity exposed male flies since they exhibited a significant decrease in mating ability and a consistently lower negative geotaxis response than the 1 g ground controls. The negative geotaxis response is the Drosophila's reaction to move opposite to the Earth's gravitational vector when disturbed in certain manners. Researchers have hypothesized that the accelerated aging, is due to an increased locomotor activity which causes a subsequent increase in mitochondrial activity. The increased mitochondrial activity, in turn, causes increased aging through accelerated damage to the mitochondrial system. An increase in locomotor activity was indicated by analyzing only a fraction (1/6th of a second) of the 15 minute video recordings of groups of Drosophila taken approximately every two days during a 14-day Space Shuttle flight. The increased locomotor activity may be related to the Drosophila's negative geotaxis response in that the flies may be reacting to the absence of normal gravity by continuously searching for the gravity vector. The aims of this study are to develop methods to accurately measure individual Drosophila activity, use these derived methods in 1 g to create a Drosophila activity baseline, and use the methods during short and long duration microgravity exposure (sounding rockets, parabolic flights, Space Shuttle, International Space Station, etc.) to examine Drosophila activity. The role of the negative geotaxis response on locomotor activity will be examined by using two strains of behaviorally selected Drosophila, one that exhibits a large or hyper negative geotaxis response and another that has a positive geotaxis response, in addition to examining flies with a normal or negative geotaxis response.