Kanchamreddy, Sree Harshitha
(2018)
Effect of microbiota on regeneration and degrowth in Schmidtea mediterranea.
UG thesis, Azim Premji University.
Abstract
Interaction between the microbiota, referring to all the microorganisms present in an organism and cellular processes plays an important role in the homeostasis of an organism. In humans, microbiota influences many phenotypes including the nutrition, drug disposition and behaviour. There have hardly been any studies that looked at significance of microbiota Schimdtea mediterranea. S.mediterranea, commonly known as planaria, are popular for their ability to regenerate lost body parts or complete organism from small fragments of their bodies. They also have the ability to survive up to three months in the absence of food by a process called degrowth. In this study we tried to look at the effect of change of microbiota on the processes of regeneration and degrowth. The microbiota was changed by treating the planaria with antibiotics and their size was quantified during regeneration and degrowth. The quantity and the diversity of microbes was observed by plating smashed planaria. From these experiments we observed that there were no drastic differences in size during regeneration and degrowth in organisms with normal and changed microbiota suggesting that microbiota may not play a role during degrowth. We also found that there was a difference in reduction in size of anterior and posterior parts during regeneration. The diversity of the microbiota varied among organisms both within and among different treatments but there were few colonies that were similar.
Actions (login required)
 |
View Item |
