Management of Drosophila lines:
The DiBio Fly Facility is host to a number of basic line “kits” such as a series of balancers (with morphological and/or GFP markers) for the major chromosomes, as well as transgenic lines such as some of the most commonly employed driver lines used to drive the expression of GAL4 in temporally and/or spatially controlled patterns. In addition we can offer assistance in selecting and ordering, Drosophila mutants, transgenic lines, lines with which to perform RNAi, or any other lines of general utility from external repository services (such as Bloomington, Harvard, VDRC, NIG-Fly Japan). The Fly Facility can provide for the maintenance, under optimal controlled conditions, of “private” Drosophila strains. This may be useful for research groups which possess unique Drosophila strains (i.e. strains which are not available in the standard international stock centers).
Equipment:
The DiBio Fly Facility can rely on: 2 Drosophila CO2 anaesthesia stations equipped with dissection stereo microscopes; A local computer network with PCs with software dedicated to image analysis and digital data analysis; 3 walk-in thermostatic rooms of which one, constantly kept at 18o C for the long term maintenance of Drosophila lines, the other two being available for the conduction of experiments under controlled environmental conditions; Modular computerised equipment for the long term acquisition of daily locomotor activity and sleep-wake cycles; High resolution digital videocamera, dedicated computer and specific software for the detailed analyses of Drosophila larval and/or adult behaviour.
Advice and experimental design:
The DiBio Fly Facility can provide support/advice in planning and performing experiments which require the use of Drosophila. In particular, requests can be directed to the Facility to prepare specific crosses for the genetic manipulation of Drosophila lines, i.e. for genetic background homogenization; for the reconstitution of binary/ternary systems (i.e. GAL4/UAS, including modulation by GAL80); for the activation of tissue-specific and/or temporally controlled RNAi; for tissue-specific and/or temporally controlled staining of tissues (i.e. GAL4/UAS controlled GFP expression). Aside from the evaluation of numerous behavioural end-points, on request the Fly Facility personnel is open to discuss the possibility of performing experiments which may, for example, require the determination of biochemical parameters (i.e. related to mitochondrial function), genomic-level analyses (i.e. RNA expression profiles), or the setting up of preparations for immuno (cyto- or histo-) chemical analyses.
Table of prices for services offered by the Fly Facility
(All prices are in Euros)
| Type of Service | UNITS | DiBio Users | Unipd Users | External Users(^) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Drosophila maintenance | culture medium | Empty vials + flug caps (euro/each) | vial | 23 | 23 | 30 | (1) |
| vials with corn medium + flug caps (euro/each) | vial | 28 | 33 | 40 | |||
| Corn medium (euro/100ml) | 100ml | 48 | 55 | 70 | (2) | ||
| Sugar-Yeast medium (euro/100ml) | 100ml | 40 | 50 | 60 | (2) | ||
| Drosophila maintenance | housing | Self-maintained Drosophila strain at 18o or 23o (1box/month) | 1 box | 5 | 5 | 8 | |
| Maintenance of Drosophila strain at 18o (2 vial/strain/month) | strain | 8 | 9 | 10 | |||
| Maintenance of Drosophila strain at 23o (2 vial/strain/month) | strain | 10 | 12 | 15 | |||
| Drosophila strain requests | Request for in-house Drosophila strains | strain | 5 | 7 | 10 | ||
| Ordering Drosophila from stock centers (^^) | working hour D technician | 30 | 50 | (3) | |||
| Ordering Drosophila from Best-Gene service (^^) | working hour D technician | 60 | 100 | (3) | |||
| Working with Drosophila | Pushing Flies (euro/hour) | hour | 0 | 0 | 2 | ||
| Stereomicroscope and anesthesia (euro/hour) | hour | 2 | 3 | 5 | |||
| Imaging using stereomicroscope and anesthesia (euro/hour) | hour | 3 | 4 | 7 | |||
| Advice and consultance (euro/h) D level technician | hour | 31 | 31 | 31 | |||
| Advice and consultance (euro/h) associate professor | hour | 48 | 48 | 48 | |||
| Behavioural analysis | Single climbing assay (euro/strain analyzed) | strain analysed | 5 | 5 | 7 | (4) | |
| Multiple climbing assay (euro/strain analyzed) | strain analysed | 10 | 12 | 15 | (4) | ||
| Optomotor Test | strain analysed | 12 | 15 | (4) | |||
| Cheker test | strain analysed | 5 | 5 | 7 | (4) | ||
| Larval speed test | strain analysed | 5 | 5 | 7 | (4) | ||
| Dam system locomotor activity (euro/monitor 10-day experiment) (^^^) | monitor utilised | 5 | 10 | 30 | (4) | ||
| Drosophila behaviour recording | hour | 10 | 12 | 15 | (4) | ||
^ 22% IVA (VAT) - has to be added
^^ Stocks’ cost, delivery and customs charges must be added
^^^ Cost of sugar-yeast medium has to be added
(1) - Orders cannot exceed 200 units
(2) - Only for Vallisneri building workers (empty bottles should be
returned)
(3) - For administrative reasons this service is not available for
external users
(4) - If the analysis is to be done by facility personnel, technical
support must be added to the latter costs (31 euro/hour)