Session I: Cryopreservation and Other Preservation of Invertebrate Models in Biomedical Research

10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. EDT
September 6, 2024 (Friday)

Chair
Joseph Rinehart, Ph.D., U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)

Agenda

10:00 a.m. – 10:10 a.m.	Opening Remarks Joseph Rinehart, Ph.D., United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Franziska Grieder, D.V.M., Ph.D., Director, Office of Research Infrastructure Programs (ORIP), National Institutes of Health (NIH) Sige Zou, Ph.D., Coordinator, Program Official, ORIP, NIH
10:10 a.m. – 12:10 p.m.	Established Models Moderators: John Bischof, University of Minnesota, and Yogesh Wairkar, National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) Keynote Presentation: John Bischof, Ph.D., University of Minnesota (25 min.) Cryopreservation of Drosophila Embryos Ann Rougvie, Ph.D., University of Minnesota (15 min. + 5 min. Q&A) Cryopreservation of C. elegans Stocks Christopher Fang-Yen, PhD, The Ohio State University (15 min + 5 min Q&A) Preservation of C. elegans by Desiccation Cale Whitworth, PhD, Indiana University (15 min + 5 min Q&A) Long-Term Maintenance of Drosophila Stocks by Live Cultures Estefania Paredes, PhD, Vigo University, Spain (15 min + 5 min Q&A) Cryopreservation of Sea Urchin
12:10 p.m. – 1:00 p.m.	Lunch Break
1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.	Emerging Models Moderators: Arun Rajamohan, Ph.D., USDA, and Mahua Mukhopadhyay, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, NIH (Biao Tian, ORIP, as backup) Keynote Presentation: Arun Rajamohan, Ph.D., USDA (25 min.) Cryopreservation of Insect Species, Including Robot as Technology Transfer Jonathan Hibshman, Ph.D., Southern Methodist University (15 min. + 5 min. Q&A) Lessons Learned from Tardigrades for Long-Term Preservation of Invertebrates Rebecca D. Sandlin, PhD, Massachusetts General Hospital (15 min + 5 min Q&A) Long-Term Preservation of Mosquitos Jeff Tomberlin, PhD, Texas A&M University (15 min + 5 min Q&A) Long-Term Preservation of Black Soldier Flies (Diapause) Lightning Round Presentations by NIH-Supported Grantees (Tentative) (10-minute talks, 5-minute Q&A) (3 min. each with Q&A after presentations) Daryl Gohl, Ph.D., University of Minnesota, ORIP grantee (Development of a Novel Method for Cryopreservation of Drosophila melanogaster) Nicholas Teets, Ph.D., University of Kentucky, ORIP Grantee (Development of Long-Term Preservation and Revival Protocols for Drosophila)
3:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.	Group Discussion Moderators: Joseph Rinehart, USDA Panelists: TBD Questions: Questions for Group Discussion

Organization Committee for Session I

Joseph Rinehart, Ph.D., U.S. Department of Agriculture, joseph.rinehart@usda.gov
(Chair of the Organizing Committee)

John Bischof, Ph.D., University of Minnesota, bischof@umn.edu

Jonathan Hibshman, Ph.D., Southern Methodist University, jhibshman@smu.edu

Veronica Frances Hinman, Ph.D., Carnegie Mellon University, veronica@cmu.edu

Ann Rougvie, Ph.D., University of Minnesota, rougv001@umn.edu

Mahua Mukhopadhyay, Ph.D., Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, National Institutes of Health (NIH), mukhopam@mail.nih.gov

Yogesh Wairkar, Ph.D., National Institute of General Medical Sciences, NIH, yogesh.wairkar@nih.gov

Susan Chandran, Office of Research Infrastructure Programs (ORIP), NIH, susan.chandran@nih.gov

Biao Tian, Ph.D., ORIP, NIH, biao.tian@nih.gov

Sige Zou, Ph.D., ORIP, NIH, sige.zou@nih.gov

Biographies – In Order of Appearance

Dr. Joseph Rinehart is a Research Leader for insect studies for the USDA-ARS in Fargo, North Dakota, where his team focuses on the cold physiology of a variety of insects, including the cryopreservation of agriculturally and ecologically important species. He has over 25 years of experience in insect cold physiology, during which he has conducted studies ranging from the stress physiology of pollinators to the molecular characterization of diapause in flesh flies and mosquitoes, to field studies on the stress physiology of an Antarctic midge (for which he was awarded the United States Antarctic Service Medal). Dr. Rinehart is also an adjunct faculty member at North Dakota State University and enjoys hosting numerous undergraduate and graduate students in his lab, including participants of an annual summer Research Experience for Undergraduates program. 

Dr. John Bischof obtained a B.S. in Bioengineering from U.C. Berkeley (UCB), an M.S. from UCB and U.C. San Francisco, and a Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from UCB. After a Postdoctoral Fellowship at Harvard in the Center for Engineering in Medicine, he joined the faculty of the University of Minnesota in 1993. Dr. Bischof is now a Distinguished McKnight University Professor, the Medtronic-Bakken Endowed Chair, Director of the Institute for Engineering in Medicine at the University of Minnesota, and Director of the NSF Engineering Research Center Advanced Technologies for the Preservation of Biological Systems (ATP-Bio).

Dr. Bischof works in the area of thermal bioengineering with a focus on cryopreservation, thermal therapy, and nanomedicine. In 2019, he became the Director of UMN’s Institute for Engineering in Medicine (IEM). One of the centers IEM helped launch is Bischof’s own $26 Million, five-year renewable NSF Engineering Research Center Advanced Technologies for the Preservation of Biological Systems (ATP-Bio), which he directs in the cryopreservation space.

Dr. Ann Rougvie obtained her B.S. in Biochemistry from Iowa State University. She earned her PhD from Cornell University, where working with Dr. John Lis, she discovered that that the promoter-proximal RNA polymerase II present on uninduced Drosophila heat shock genes was transcriptionally engaged, but stalled, revealing a post initiation rate-limiting step in gene expression. Following completion of her degree, she began studies of developmental timing in the nematode C. elegans as a postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Victor Ambros at Harvard University. Dr. Rougvie continued those studies after establishing her own lab at the University of Minnesota in 1992 and deciphered the mechanisms that time developmental events in animals with high precision while maintaining the flexibility to contend with variable environmental conditions.

Dr. Rougvie is in her 17^th year as Director of the NIH-funded Caenorhabditis Genetics Center (CGC), the international repository and distribution center for C. elegans strains. Her tenure has seen a nearly 7-fold increase in usage, and the CGC now ships ~30,000 samples per year to support scientists world-wide.

Christopher Fang-Yen completed a B.S. in physics and mathematics at Stanford University and a Ph. D. in physics at MIT.  Following postdoctoral appointments at MIT and Harvard University, he joined the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania as an Assistant Professor and then Associate Professor in the Department of Bioengineering and Department of Neuroscience.  Since 2023 Dr. Fang-Yen has been Professor of Biomedical Engineering at the Ohio State University.  He and his research group develop innovative technologies and apply them to address questions in biology, using the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans as a model.  

Cale Whitworth, Ph.D. is Co-Director of the Bloomington Drosophila Stock Center (BDSC), internationally recognized as the primary source of Drosophila melanogaster strains used for research. Dr. Whitworth obtained his Ph.D. in Cell, Molecular, and Developmental Biology from Johns Hopkins University where he examined mechanisms of human disorders of sexual development using Drosophila melanogaster as a model system. He continued his work on sexual development as postdoctoral fellow in the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases of the National Institutes of Health. As Co-Director of the BDSC, Dr. Whitworth is a Principal Investigator on P40OD018537 funded by ORIP, NINDS, and NIGMS, and he is involved in all aspects of Center administration including operations, finance, advocacy, research activities, and, most importantly, ensuring the collection meets the ever-changing needs of the research community.

Dr. Estefania Paredes holds a degree and a PhD in Oceanography, and she is a Ramon and Cajal- appointed professor at the University of Vigo (Spain). Dr. Paredes is the President of the Spanish Society of Cryobiology (SECRIO) and adjunct professor at the UNESCO Chair of Cryobiology (based in Ukraine). She is an elected member of the Board of Governors of the Society for Cryobiology and the Board of the Association of Galician Oceanographers.

Her research focus is on Marine Cryobiology, developing protocols for the preservation of marine organisms and cells with the applications on model organisms' conservation, biobanking, aquaculture, and biodiversity conservation.

Dr. Arun Rajamohan is a Research Entomologist and the Lead Scientist for the Weed and Insect Biology Research Unit at the USDA-ARS-Edward T. Schafer Agricultural Research Center in Fargo, ND. Dr. Rajamohan has an M.Phil. and a Ph.D. in Zoology from the University of Madras in Chennai, India. While for the doctoral research, Dr. Rajamohan studied the marine shrimp larval cryopreservation, during the past >20 years, Rajamohan has concentrated on insect embryos and germplasm preservation research. As the cryobiologist in the Fargo USDA-ARS Unit, Dr. Rajamohan is responsible for all cryopreservation efforts at the USDA in Fargo. More specifically, Dr. Rajamohan develops original cryopreservation storage technologies for pollinators such as honeybees and bumble bees, pest species such as the tephritid fruit flies and the new world screwworm, as well as other insects of importance such as the monarch butterfly and the endangered Sacramento checkerspot butterfly. Incumbent also develops quality control methods for cryopreserved and cold stored insects to ensure physiologically normal post-storage development of the embryos to reproducing adults. 

Dr. Jon Hibshman is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Southern Methodist University. He graduated from Gettysburg College with a double major in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and Philosophy. He then obtained his PhD in Genetics and Genomics at Duke University, working to better understand both immediate and intergenerational responses to starvation and dietary restriction in C. elegans. As an NIH F32-funded postdoc at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill he developed a research program that seeks to reveal mechanisms of extreme stress tolerance, with a particular focus on desiccation. His lab at Southern Methodist University uses a panel of model organisms including tardigrades, C. elegans, and bacteria, and implements biochemical, genetic, cell biological, and molecular methods to discover new protectants and decipher the mechanisms by which they function to promote survival of extremes.

Dr. Rebecca Sandlin is an Assistant Professor at the Center for Engineering in Medicine and Surgery (CEMS) at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital. She received a PhD in Chemistry where she studied biocrystallization, malaria parasite biology and high-throughput screening. During her postdoctoral training, she transitioned to the field of cryobiology, where she developed techniques to preserve whole blood and circulating tumor cells for clinical and research applications. As a faculty member, Dr. Sandlin’s laboratory focuses on the development of biostabilization methods for a range of specimens including parasites, human primary cells, and whole organisms. To overcome obstacles associated with the preservation of delicate specimens, Dr. Sandlin’s lab has developed approaches to efficient experimental design for screening cryoprotective agents and specialized specimen containers to achieve rapid heat transfer.

Dr. Jeffery K. Tomberlin is a Professor, AgriLife Research Fellow, & Presidential Impact Fellow in the Department of Entomology at Texas A&M University and Fellow of the Entomological Society of America. He is the principal investigator of the Forensic Laboratory for Investigative Entomological Sciences (F.L.I.E.S.) Facility (https://forensicentomology.tamu.edu) at Texas A&M University, and he is the Director of the National Science Foundation Center for Environmental Sustainability through Insect Farming.

Dr. Tomberlin’s research efforts for the past 27 years have been developing methods to produce alternate protein sources for use as livestock, poultry, and aquaculture feed from these resources. These efforts have been accomplished predominantly through his research with the black soldier fly. To date, he has edited 8 books, published 28 book chapters and more than 260 research articles. He was recently recognized as a Fellow by the Entomological Society of America. Dr. Tomberlin has worked with companies throughout the world including, but not limited to Malaysia, China, and Australia.

Daryl Gohl, Ph.D., leads the University of Minnesota Genomics Center’s Innovation Lab and is a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Genetics, Cell Biology, and Development at the University of Minnesota. Daryl received his Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from Princeton University and did his postdoctoral training in the Department of Neurobiology at Stanford University. Daryl's work has focused on developing new tools for genetic manipulation of Drosophila and other organisms and on developing new techniques for genomics-based measurements. In addition to his academic work, Daryl is a co-founder of two biotech companies, CoreBiome, Inc. and Objective Biotechnology.

Dr. Nick Teets is an Associate Professor in the Department of Entomology at University of Kentucky. His lab primarily focuses on the mechanisms by which insects survive extreme environmental conditions. Fundamental research includes comparative physiology and genomics of Antarctic insects, evolutionary genetics of thermal tolerance, and molecular mechanisms of overwintering dormancy. More recently, the lab has begun exploring applications of this work, including applying lessons from nature to improve insect cryopreservation. The lab has received funding from NSF, NIH, and USDA for this work. Dr. Teets also holds a teaching appointment and teaches a general entomology course and an advanced molecular genetics course. The lab is also active in K-12 outreach, including designing and leading a week-long genetics "bootcamp" for local high school students.

Dr. Veronica Hinman obtained her PhD from the University of Queensland in Australia and received a postdoctoral appointment at the California Institute of Technology. She gained extensive training in developmental biology during her postgraduate studies and as a postdoc in Eric Davidson’s lab. Dr. Hinman’s research focuses on understanding how gene regulatory networks (GRNs) can explain developmental phenomena using echinoderm model systems, with particular expertise in the cis-regulatory basis of gene expression in development. As a model system for this work, she developed the sea star, Patria miniata, and established various protocols, including microinjection for gene knockdowns, and expressing transgenes, cell lineage tracking, and in vivo time-lapse imaging. Dr. Hinman currently serve as the Director of Echinobase, the genome model organism database for several Echinoderm species, which involves extensive project management, including managing multi-PI grants. She has led an active research lab at Carnegie Mellon University for over 15 years.