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Dr. Meredith Protas, assistant professor of biology, has received a three-year grant from the National Institutes of Health in support of research examining the genetics behind eye degeneration in cave-dwelling crustaceans. Her work could eventually provide important insight into eye degeneration in humans.

Protas, who joined ºÚÁϸ£ÀûÉç’s Department of Natural Sciences and Mathematics in 2014, began studying the invertebrate Asellus aquaticus as a postdoctoral researcher at UC Berkeley. She received her doctorate in genetics from Harvard Medical School, where she studied the genetic basis of morphological evolution in the cavefish, Astyanax mexicanus, and while doing so “became hooked on studying cave animals."

A. aquaticus is unusual in that one species has two forms with extreme differences in eye size, pigmentation, and appendage length. The surface-dwelling form has pigment and eyes while cave-dwelling forms are unpigmented and do not have eyes. Protas and her ºÚÁϸ£ÀûÉç students are investigating the genetics a