Search for the modifiers of amyloid--42 mediated cell death in Drosophila eye. Andrew Steffensmeier¹, Oorvashi Roy Puli², Meghana Tare², Madhuri Kango-Singh², Amit Singh². 1) Pre-Med, University of Dayton. 300 College Park Drive, Dayton, Ohio, 45469; 2) Department of Biology, University of Dayton. 300 College Park Drive, Dayton, Ohio, 45469.

   Alzheimers disease (AD) is an age-related, progressive neurodegenerative disorder. The reason for Alzheimers neuropathology is the generation of large aggregates of A42 that are toxic in nature, and induce oxidative stress, aberrant signaling and many other cellular alterations that trigger neuronal cell death. However, the exact mechanisms leading to cell death are not clearly understood. We employ a Drosophila eye model of AD to study how A42 causes neurodegeneration. Misexpression of higher levels of A42 in the differentiating photoreceptors of the fly retina rapidly induced aberrant cellular phenotypes and cell death. We looked for the modifiers of neurodegeneration phenotype of A42 n the eye disc as well as the adult eye using a gain-of-function approach. Here we present our findings on the genetic interactions of one of the modifier which can rescue the amyloid plaque mediated cell death in the Drosophila eye.