Clement Kent

York University, Biology, Adjunct Professor

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Researcher and rewilder. I try to understand pollinators and pollinatees both through the scientific method and through practical efforts to improve habitats for them.
Address: https://biology.gradstudies.yorku.ca/faculty/clement-kent/

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Additional file 7: of Enabling cell-type-specific behavioral epigenetics in Drosophila: a modified high-yield INTACT method reveals the impact of social environment on the epigenetic landscape in dopaminergic neurons

Differentially marked Islands called by SICER. Table of islands called as differentially marked b... more

Plasticity and Gene by Environment Interactions in Complex Phenotypes of Adult Drosophila melanogaster

Behaviour genetics deals with complex phenotypes which respond flexibly to environments animals e... more Behaviour genetics deals with complex phenotypes which respond flexibly to environments animals experience. Change of phenotype in response to environment is phenotypic plasticity. A central question is how genes influence plasticity. I study plasticity and gene by environment interactions (GEI) relating to behaviours, metabolic, and genomic phenotypes of adults of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. Chapters 1-3 study cuticular hydrocarbon (CH) levels of male flies. Chapter 1 shows male CH levels respond to time of day and light. Methods are developed to reduce high variability of CH. I show variation in CH parallels activity of two classes of CH synthesis hormones. Analysis of rate of variation gives estimates of turnover rates of CH and the metabolic cost of signaling. Chapter 2 studies mixed groups of genetically different flies, "hosts" and "visitors". GEI of CH are found with both abiotic factors and with social mix. Social mix results in GEI as strong as abiotic factors. Indirect Genetic Effects (IGE) theory is used to show frequencydependent IGE interactions. Chapter 3 shows that males in mixed social environments reduce expression of clock and CH synthesis genes, resulting in different signals. Females mate more often with males in a mixed group than with single-genotype males. Plasticity in male gene expression in response to social environment leads to different signals, mating levels, and potentially different fitness. Chapter 4 deals with behaviour, metabolite, and genomic phenotypes in flies differing in foraging gene alleles, as the food environment is changed. Strong GEI is found, structured by food type, chemical class of metabolite, and gene metabolic roles. A concept called "relative nutrient sensitivity" suggests an interaction between foraging and the insulin signaling pathway. I demonstrate epistasis between for and insulin with quantitative genetic methods and bioinformatics. These results lead to the conclusion that GEI are common in many fly phenotypes in response to well studied environments such as food and less studied ones such as social group. Some implications of this for maintenance of genetic variance are discussed. iii Acknowledgments I thank Prof. Marla B. Sokolowski for support and encouragement throughout, and Prof. Joel Levine for stimulating discussions and steadfast belief in the quality of our work. I thank committee members Prof. Gary Sprules and Prof. Timothy Westwood for comments and advice, all external reviewers of the papers making up Chapters 1-4 for their comments, and of course my many collaborators in this work. Prof. Allen Moore asked stimulating questions about plasticity and was a constructive external examiner. I thank the many members of the Sokolowski and Levine labs whose advice and help made this work far more pleasant. Thanks for all the flies! Thanks to Karen Williams for many thoughtful discussions on insulin and flies; to Amsale Belay and Karla Kaun for lots of help with learning fly wrangling and understanding fly metabolism; to Ken Dawson-Scully for many scientific discussions ranging from ion channels to stress-related behaviours to computer geekdom; to Craig Riedl for computer wizardry and fly breeding schemes; to Hiwote Belay for indispensable help in the molecular lab, to Hiwote and Mark Fitzpatrick for rubber bands and other practical jokes, and to Mark for great references on evolutionary topics; to Scott Douglas for fly stocks and listening to my complaints on same; and especially to Brandon Sheffield and Bianco Marco for indispensable technical help with flies, behaviours, and spectrophotometer assays. Special thanks to Reza Azanchi for a ton of work and unfailing good humour, to Ben Smith, Joshua Krupp for the steadiest hands on the planet, Julia Schonfeld, Jayed Atallah, Amanda Formosa, Adrienne Chu, and Olga Sizova for GC advice and data, and putting up with weird R printouts. Thanks to Jean-Christophe Billeter for many discussions and for help with Adobe Illustrator. Special thanks to Prof. Ralph Greenspan, whose ideas and data jumpstarted this research and whose patience in awaiting results was exemplary. Thanks for scientific advice and feedback on talks go to Prof. Mark Blows and Prof. Stephen Goodwin, and for a few words on fly sex appeal to Dr. Jean-Marc Jallon. Patience was also noteworthy from several people: my partner Leena Raudvee whose unfailing support and listening post was essential, my parents Elizabeth Casey Kent and Clement F. Kent Jr. whose early teachings in biology and mathematics helped set me on this path, and to Prof. Roger Hansell, Prof. Nick Collins, and especially the late Prof. Jyri Paloheimo who helped guide an earlier foray into ecology.

Clement Kent

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