Honors Theses

Date of Award

2021

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Degree Name

BS

Department

Biology

Faculty Mentor

Mary B. Kroetz

Abstract

Bisphenol A (BPA) has been present in our environment since 1891 when it was first synthesized by Aleksandr Dianin. BPA has since been a topic of interest due to the possibility of diseases associated in human consumption of the chemical. Interestingly, Caenorhabditiselegans, commonly known as C.eleganshave shown to be able to tolerate the chemical. Thisorganism is an advantageous model organism for research since they are simple organisms to study, cheap, produce a large brood size, and have a short life cycle. Previously a forward genetic screen was done to isolate 2000 healthy strains in order to determine which strains showed sensitivity to BPA.bin-1, a mutant strain, was isolated and was fully sequenced to determine the gene responsible for BPA sensitivity. It was found that bin-1was essential for BPA sensitivity because the BIN-1 protein caused the animals to be able to survive in the presence of BPA. The BIN-1 protein is predicted to function as a glycosylase, although this has yet to be tested. Research done by Nakajima has found that other animals such as freshwater algae and tobacco cell lines have been able to glycosylate BPA(Nakajima et al. 2004 and Nakajima et al. 2007). Therefore, my research is centered upon (1) characterizing BPA-sensitive strains found in a forward genetic screen and (2) prioritizing which strains are most sensitive to BPA. This was performed through daily sensitivity tests. I expected to find some strains to show sensitivity and some do not. With the results of my research, I will be able to determine which strains showed increased sensitivity and need to be further tested to see why they are showing sensitivity to BPA.

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