My Research

I am currently a Postdoctoral Research Associate in Christopher Kearney’s Lab at Baylor University. Click the button below to learn more about the Kearney Lab.

Using Plants to Kill Mosquitoes

I study nectar producing plants and their interactions with different insect species from both an ecological and molecular biology perspective.  I look to apply this information to develop plant biotech products for insect population control.  My current project examines the nectar feeding behaviors of various mosquito species.  I monitor the mosquito-attractiveness of several nectar-producing plants, most specifically different species of Impatiens, in both lab and garden settings.  Additionally, after identifying the most attractive plants, I genetically transform them into tools for mosquito population control.  This requires an intersection between genomic DNA, RNA, and protein analyses to understand how best to modify the plant to accomplish this goal.

 

Current Projects

Mosquito Outdoor Nectar-Feeding Behavior Study

Mosquito Feeding of Pesticide-Laced Nectar

Isolation of Native Impatiens Promoters

mesocosm tent.png

Mosquito Outdoor Nectar-Feeding Behavior Study

A recent study by Kearney and Chen showed that Aedes and Culex mosquitoes will preferentially feed on the nectar of Impatiens walleriana (1).  Since this study utilized large, indoor cages to test mosquito feeding behaviors, I am interested in seeing if impatiens will maintain this level of attractiveness in its natural environment:  a garden.  This means not only being outdoors, but also surrounded by potential competitors.  This study will be conducted in Texas, Mississippi, and Florida to also measure whether regionality will influence mosquito attractiveness.

pesticide plant copy.jpg

Mosquito Feeding of Pesticide-Laced Nectar

Previous studies have shown that mosquitoes will die after feeding on sugar mixed with pesticides. These traps are known as attractive toxic sugar bates (ATSBs). ATSBs use artificial containers, which may not be the most optimal delivery platform for targeting mosquitoes (2). One alternative platform that could be used is plants. Since mosquitoes do feed on plant nectar, I am interested in seeing if pesticide-laced nectar is capable of killing mosquitoes. This would demonstrate whether toxic nectar is a viable delivery platform for killing mosquitoes.

dna.png

Isolation of Native Impatiens Promoters

In order to deliver toxins to mosquitoes, they must first be expressed in the nectar of impatiens.  This requires a nectary promoter and nectar signal peptide.  Finding a good candidate promoter requires a synthesis of protein, RNA, and DNA analysis.  We used a combination of mass spectrometry, RNA-seq, and genomic sequencing to find native promoters in impatiens.  We are currently working on transforming impatiens tissue culture with this promoter region to test its efficiency for foreign protein expression.

Publications and Presentations:

Publications

  • Ghidey, M., Islam, S.M.A., Pruett, G., Kearney, C.M., 2020. Making plants into cost-effective bioreactors for highly active antimicrobial peptides. New Biotechnology 56, 63–70. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nbt.2019.12.001

  • Kearney, C.M., Pruett, G., 2018. Targeted mosquitocidal toxins. US20180282757A1.

  • Pruett, G., Hawes, J., Varnado, W., Deerman, H., Goddard, J., Burkett-Cadena, N., Kearney, C., 2020. The readily transformable Impatiens walleriana efficiently attracts nectar feeding with Aedes and Culex mosquitoes in simulated outdoor garden settings in Mississippi and Florida. Acta Tropica 210, 105624. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actatropica.2020.105624

  • Zhou, Y., Ghidey, M.R., Pruett, G., Kearney, C.M., 2020. The use of functionally deficient viral vectors as visualization tools to reveal complementation patterns between plant viruses and the silencing suppressor p19. Journal of Virological Methods 286, 113980. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jviromet.2020.113980

Presentations

  • “The readily-transformable Impatiens walleriana efficiently attracts nectar feeding with Aedes and Culex mosquitoes in outdoor garden settings in Mississippi and Florida.” Grace Pruett, Julia Hawes, Wendy Varnado, Hunter Deerman, Jerome Goddard, Nathan Burkett-Cadena, and Christopher Kearney. Oral Presentation. Texas Mosquito Control Association Fall Meeting. October 2019. Waco, TX. Award: First Place Award in the 2nd Annual Student Competition.

  • "Problem Solving with Plants: Isolating promoters to construct a nectar delivery system formosquito population control in Impatiens walleriana." Grace Pruett, Andrew Cox, Heather Lanier, Luke Richardson, Annie Sun, Marissa Pinson, Thuy Nguyen, Clay Carter, Mark Hampton and Christopher Kearney. Oral Presentation. Baylor University CEGSS Biology Symposium. May 2019. Waco, TX. Award: Session 2 Best Presenter.

  • "Isolating promoters to construct a nectar delivery system for mosquito population controlin Impatiens walleriana." Grace Pruett, Andrew Cox, Heather Lanier, Luke Richardson, Annie Sun, Marissa Pinson, Thuy Nguyen, Clay Carter, Mark Hampton and Christopher Kearney. International Association for PlantBiotechnology Congress. August 2018. Poster. Dublin, Ireland.

 References:

  1. Chen, Z. & Kearney, C. M. Nectar protein content and attractiveness to Aedes aegypti and Culex pipiens in plants with nectar/insect associations. Acta Trop. 146, 81–88 (2015).

  2. Fiorenzano, J. M., Koehler, P. G. & Xue, R.-D. Attractive Toxic Sugar Bait (ATSB) For Control of Mosquitoes and Its Impact on Non-Target Organisms: A Review. Int J Environ Res Public Health 14, (2017).