Kristen Brubaker, Ph.D.

Teaching

Cell Biology lecture and laboratories; Molecular Biology laboratory; Immunology; Cancer Biology

Research Interests

My research interests lie in the regulation of the stress responses in bees.  I have been studying transcription factors that aid in the survival of invasive bees in conditions where honey bees would normally not survive.  In the past few years, in collaboration with Dr. John Hranitz, we have been studying metabolism in honey bees in response to ethanol.  Honey bees were treated with ethanol (or control) and RNA was isolated for real time PCR experiments, to study gene expression changes indicated by an initial microarray experiment.  We conducted real-time PCR experiments to verify gene expression changes.  One of my undergraduate students, Justin Heller, is currently working on his Master’s degree pursuing genes involved in alcohol tolerance. We are measuring gene expression of hsp-70 to demonstrate a stress response, and two genes, jwa and dunce, that have been reported to be involved in alcohol tolerance. 

Recent Grants and Research Funding

"Expression Study of Acute Alcohol Tolerance-Associated Genes jwa and hangover in Apis mellifera (Western honey bee)." Research and Scholarship Mini-Grant. Kristen Brubaker (2019-2021).

"Ethanol-Induced Changes in Gene Expression in the Brain of European Honey Bees, Apis mellifera," Research and Scholarship Mini-Grant. Kristen Brubaker and John Hranitz (2018-2019).