Aida de la Cruz
Past Projects
Aida de la Cruz graduated from the University of Oregon where she studied Biology, Chemistry and Swedish. She studied structure and thermostability of bacterial chemotaxis proteins in Dr. Frederick Dahlquist’s lab. She then moved to FredHutch to work for Drs. Lee Hartwell, Steve Friend, and Bruce Edgar to find synthetic lethal interactions within fruit flies to isolate proteins that are homologous in humans, which could then be targeted for anti-cancer treatment. She continued to work with Dr. Bruce Edgar and studied cell growth and cell proliferation control in the developing fruit fly. She was interested in how homologues of human oncogenes and tumor suppressors have essential roles in fruit fly development with regards to regulating body, organ, and cell size.
Current Projects
Aida is interested in speciation. She specifically wants to know how a rapidly evolving heterochromatin binding protein, OdsH, contributes to the observed hybrid sterility phenotype between two closely related species. OdsH protein localization differs between the 2 species and she hopes to isolate the satellite repeats OdsH bind to. This may help her understand why these two species have become reproductively isolated.
She is also interested in the relationship between centromeric Histone H3 (CenH3) and the chaperone that brings it to the centromere. Most eukayotes have retained this chaperone, and 2 distantly related proteins have been seen to functionally compliment each other. However, there are several species that have lost this chaperone and replaced it with a new one. She would like to know what innovations have taken place to accommodate this raplacement.
Lastly, Aida is trying to clone a collection of Drosophila melanogaster mutants. The mutations cause maternal-effect embryonic lethality and are worsened or rescued by adding more heterochromatin. She has narrowed down the loci of the three mutations to very small regions and hopes to understand why interactions between heterochromatin and these loci lead to maternal-effect lethality.
Personal
Aida loves to travel and being outdoors. She can’t imagine a life without grass, court, fairways, waves or camp fire under her worn feet and an unexpired passport ready to go. She also enjoys cooking and visual arts (meaning she watches way too many movies) and paints or draws when time permits. She feels exceptionally lucky to live in the great pacific northwest and to work at Fred Hutch.
Publications
Kursel LE, McConnell H, de la Cruz AFA, Malik HS. (2021) Gametic specialization of centromeric histone paralogs in Drosophila virilis. Life Sci Alliance, May 13;4(7):e202000992
Phadnis, N., Baker, E. P., Cooper, J. C., Frizzell, K. A., Hsieh, E., de la Cruz, A. F. A., Shendure, J., Kitzman, J. O. & Malik, H. S. (2015) An essential cell cycle regulation gene causes hybrid inviability in Drosophila. Science 350: 1552-5.
Benjamin D. Ross, Leah Rosin, Andreas W. Thomae, Mary Alice Hiatt, Danielle Vermaak, Aida Flor A. de la Cruz, Axel Imhof, Barbara G. Mellone, Harmit S. Malik (2013) Stepwise Evolution of Essential Centromere Function in a Drosophila Neogene. Science 7:340, 1211-1214
Icreverzi, A, de la Cruz, A.F., Van Voorhies, W, Edgar, B.A., (2012), Drosophila CyclinD/Cdk4 regulates mitochondrial biogenesis, aging, and sensitizes animals to hypoxic stress. Cell Cycle, 11:3, 554-568.
Shibutani, S.T., de la Cruz, A.F., Tran, V., Turbyfill, W.J., Reis, T., Edgar, B.A., Duronio, R.J. (2008) Intrinsic negative cell cycle regulation provided by PIP box- and Cul4Cdt2-mediated destruction of E2f1 during S phase. Dev Cell. 6:890-900.
de la Cruz, A.F., Edgar, B.A. (2008) Flow cytometric analysis of Drosophila cells. Methods Mol. Biol. 420:373-89.
Buttitta, L., Katzaroff, A., Perez, C., de la Cruz, A., Edgar, B.A. (2007) A double-assurance mechanism controls cell cycle exit upon terminal differentiation in Drosophila. Dev. Cell. 12:631-643.
Hall, D., Grewal, S., de la Cruz, A., Edgar, B.A. (2007) Rheb-TOR signaling promotes protein synthesis, but not glucose or amino acid import, in Drosophila. BMC Biol. 19:5-10.
Datar, S. A., Galloni, M., de la Cruz, A., Marti, M., Edgar, B. A., Frei, C. (2006) Mammalian Cyclin D1/Cdk4 complexes induce cell growth in Drosophila. Cell Cycle 5:647-652.
Emmerich, J., Meyer, C.A., de la Cruz, A.F., Edgar, B.A., Lehner, C.F. (2004) Cyclin D does not provide essential Cdk4-independent functions in Drosophila. Genetics 168:867-875.
Datar, S.A., Jacobs, H.W., de la Cruz, A.A., Lehner, C.F., and Edgar, B.A. (2000) The Drosophila Cyclin D-Cdk4 complex promotes cellular growth. EMBO J. 19:4543-4554.
Neufeld, T.P., de la Cruz, A.A., Johnston, L.A., and Edgar, B.A. (1998) Coordination of growth and cell division in the Drosophila wing. Cell 93:1183-1193.
Usher K.C., de la Cruz, A.A., Dahlquist F.W., Swanson R.V., Simon M.I., Remington S.J. (1998) Crystal structures of CheY from Thermotoga maritima do not support conventional explanations for the structural basis of enhanced thermostability. Protein Sci. 7:403-412.
McEvoy M.M., de la Cruz, A.A., Dahlquist F.W. (1997) Large modular proteins by NMR. Nat Struct Biol. 4:9.
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