Effects of Presenilin Knockdown, Sulfateless Knockdown, and Simultaneous Knockdown on Gene Expression in Drosophila melanogaster fat body

The goal of this study was to examine the expression changes in metabolic genes in Drosophila melanogaster fat body resulting from knockdown of presenilin (Psn), sulfateless (sfl), and both simultaneously. Sfl is a gene that contributes to the structure of Heparan Sulfate (HS), a major co-receptor for growth factors. Growth factors suppress catabolic processes, so it is hypothesized that a reduction in growth factor signaling would accelerate autophagy, mitochondrial biosynthesis, and lipid catabolism. Psn knockdown reveals perturbations in the same metabolic processes and serves to model Alzheimer's Disease biology. This study seeks to investigate HS as a putative target for ameliorating disease characteristics.