About

Richard Carthew is the Principal Investigator and Owen L. Coon Professor of Molecular Biosciences at carthewlab.org. The page lists him as the lead faculty member overseeing a diverse research team including postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, undergraduate students, research technicians, and lab management staff. While the page provides detailed information about the interests of his lab members, such as evolution of complex body forms, ordered patterning in the Drosophila eye, lncRNAs and development, organ growth control, planar cell polarity in epithelial tissues, and links between metabolism and developmental gene regulation, it does not explicitly describe Professor Carthew's own research focus, background, or key contributions. Therefore, no direct narrative biography of Professor Richard Carthew is available from the provided page text.

Research topics

• Biology
• Genetics
• Cell biology
• Biochemistry
• Computer Science
• Artificial Intelligence
• Computational biology
• Chemistry
• Evolutionary biology

Selected publications

• Ribozyme-Mediated Knockdown of lncRNA Gene Expression in <em>Drosophila</em>

  BIO-PROTOCOL · 2025-01-01

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  . Key features • The ribozyme has the potential to knock down any RNA but is particularly useful for long noncoding RNAs, which can be resistant to mutations. • The ribozyme is useful for the knockdown of nuclear-localized RNAs as well as RNAs that overlap with other genes in the genome. • Ribozyme knockdown is typically stronger than RNAi and occurs in every cell. • Insertion of the ribozyme cassette in the 5' region of a transcript ensures that most of the transcript is degraded.

  PublisherDOI

• Reviewer #1 (Public Review): Scaling between cell cycle duration and wing growth is regulated by Fat-Dachsous signaling in Drosophila

  2024-05-24

  peer-reviewOpen accessSenior author

  The atypical cadherins Fat and Dachsous (Ds) signal through the Hippo pathway to regulate growth of numerous organs, including the Drosophila wing. Here, we find that Ds-Fat signaling tunes a unique feature of cell proliferation found to control the rate of wing growth during the third instar larval phase. The duration of the cell cycle increases in direct proportion to the size of the wing, leading to linear-like growth during the third instar. Ds-Fat signaling enhances the rate at which the cell cycle lengthens with wing size, thus diminishing the rate of wing growth. We show that this results in a complex but stereotyped relative scaling of wing growth with body growth in Drosophila. Finally, we examine the dynamics of Fat and Ds protein distribution in the wing, observing graded distributions that change during growth. However, the significance of these dynamics is unclear since perturbations in expression have negligible impact on wing growth.

  PublisherDOI

• Scaling between cell cycle duration and wing growth is regulated by Fat-Dachsous signaling in Drosophila

  eLife · 2024-05-24

  preprintOpen accessSenior author

  Abstract The atypical cadherins Fat and Dachsous (Ds) signal through the Hippo pathway to regulate growth of numerous organs, including the Drosophila wing. Here, we find that Ds-Fat signaling tunes a unique feature of cell proliferation found to control the rate of wing growth during the third instar larval phase. The duration of the cell cycle increases in direct proportion to the size of the wing, leading to linear-like growth during the third instar. Ds-Fat signaling enhances the rate at which the cell cycle lengthens with wing size, thus diminishing the rate of wing growth. We show that this results in a complex but stereotyped relative scaling of wing growth with body growth in Drosophila. Finally, we examine the dynamics of Fat and Ds protein distribution in the wing, observing graded distributions that change during growth. However, the significance of these dynamics is unclear since perturbations in expression have negligible impact on wing growth.

  PublisherDOI

• Scaling between cell cycle duration and wing growth is regulated by Fat-Dachsous signaling in Drosophila

  eLife · 2024-06-06

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  The atypical cadherins Fat and Dachsous (Ds) signal through the Hippo pathway to regulate growth of numerous organs, including the Drosophila wing. Here, we find that Ds-Fat signaling tunes a unique feature of cell proliferation found to control the rate of wing growth during the third instar larval phase. The duration of the cell cycle increases in direct proportion to the size of the wing, leading to linear-like growth during the third instar. Ds-Fat signaling enhances the rate at which the cell cycle lengthens with wing size, thus diminishing the rate of wing growth. We show that this results in a complex but stereotyped relative scaling of wing growth with body growth in Drosophila . Finally, we examine the dynamics of Fat and Ds protein distribution in the wing, observing graded distributions that change during growth. However, the significance of these dynamics is unclear since perturbations in expression have negligible impact on wing growth.

  PublisherDOI

• Author response: Scaling between cell cycle duration and wing growth is regulated by Fat-Dachsous signaling in Drosophila

  2024-06-06

  peer-reviewOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Author response: Scaling between cell cycle duration and wing growth is regulated by Fat-Dachsous signaling in Drosophila

  2024-05-24

  peer-reviewOpen accessSenior author

  The atypical cadherins Fat and Dachsous (Ds) signal through the Hippo pathway to regulate growth of numerous organs, including the Drosophila wing. Here, we find that Ds-Fat signaling tunes a unique feature of cell proliferation found to control the rate of wing growth during the third instar larval phase. The duration of the cell cycle increases in direct proportion to the size of the wing, leading to linear-like growth during the third instar. Ds-Fat signaling enhances the rate at which the cell cycle lengthens with wing size, thus diminishing the rate of wing growth. We show that this results in a complex but stereotyped relative scaling of wing growth with body growth in Drosophila. Finally, we examine the dynamics of Fat and Ds protein distribution in the wing, observing graded distributions that change during growth. However, the significance of these dynamics is unclear since perturbations in expression have negligible impact on wing growth.

  PublisherDOI

• Robust and heritable knockdown of gene expression using a self-cleaving ribozyme in <i>Drosophila</i>

  Genetics · 2024-05-03 · 1 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  The current toolkit for genetic manipulation in the model animal Drosophila melanogaster is extensive and versatile but not without its limitations. Here, we report a powerful and heritable method to knockdown gene expression in D. melanogaster using the self-cleaving N79 hammerhead ribozyme, a modification of a naturally occurring ribozyme found in the parasite Schistosoma mansoni. A 111-bp ribozyme cassette, consisting of the N79 ribozyme surrounded by insulating spacer sequences, was inserted into 4 independent long noncoding RNA genes as well as the male-specific splice variant of doublesex using scarless CRISPR/Cas9-mediated genome editing. Ribozyme-induced RNA cleavage resulted in robust destruction of 3' fragments typically exceeding 90%. Single molecule RNA fluorescence in situ hybridization results suggest that cleavage and destruction can even occur for nascent transcribing RNAs. Knockdown was highly specific to the targeted RNA, with no adverse effects observed in neighboring genes or the other splice variants. To control for potential effects produced by the simple insertion of 111 nucleotides into genes, we tested multiple catalytically inactive ribozyme variants and found that a variant with scrambled N79 sequence best recapitulated natural RNA levels. Thus, self-cleaving ribozymes offer a novel approach for powerful gene knockdown in Drosophila, with potential applications for the study of noncoding RNAs, nuclear-localized RNAs, and specific splice variants of protein-coding genes.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Energy metabolism modulates the regulatory impact of activators on gene expression

  Development · 2023-12-08 · 2 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Gene expression is a regulated process fueled by ATP consumption. Therefore, regulation must be coupled to constraints imposed by the level of energy metabolism. Here, we explore this relationship both theoretically and experimentally. A stylized mathematical model predicts that activators of gene expression have variable impact depending on metabolic rate. Activators become less essential when metabolic rate is reduced and more essential when metabolic rate is enhanced. We find that, in the Drosophila eye, expression dynamics of the yan gene are less affected by loss of EGFR-mediated activation when metabolism is reduced, and the opposite effect is seen when metabolism is enhanced. The effects are also seen at the level of pattern regularity in the adult eye, where loss of EGFR-mediated activation is mitigated by lower metabolism. We propose that gene activation is tuned by energy metabolism to allow for faithful expression dynamics in the face of variable metabolic conditions.

  PublisherDOI

• Reviewer #2 (Public Review): Scaling between cell cycle duration and wing growth is regulated by Fat-Dachsous signaling in Drosophila

  2023-11-30

  peer-reviewOpen accessSenior author

  The atypical cadherins Fat and Dachsous (Ds) signal through the Hippo pathway to regulate growth of numerous organs, including the Drosophila wing. Here, we find that Ds-Fat signaling tunes a unique feature of cell proliferation found to control the rate of wing growth. The duration of the cell cycle increases in direct proportion to the size of the wing, leading to linear rather than exponential growth. Ds-Fat signaling enhances the rate at which the cell cycle lengthens with wing size, thus diminishing the linear rate of wing growth. We show that this results in a complex but stereotyped relative scaling of wing growth with body growth in Drosophila. Finally, we examine the dynamics of Fat and Ds protein distribution in the wing, observing graded distributions that change during growth. However, the significance of these dynamics is unclear since perturbations in expression have negligible impact on wing growth.

  PublisherDOI

• Scaling between cell cycle duration and wing growth is regulated by Fat-Dachsous signaling in <i>Drosophila</i>

  bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2023-08-03

  preprintOpen accessSenior authorCorresponding

  Abstract The atypical cadherins Fat and Dachsous (Ds) signal through the Hippo pathway to regulate growth of numerous organs, including the Drosophila wing. Here, we find that Ds-Fat signaling tunes a unique feature of cell proliferation found to control the rate of wing growth during the third instar larval phase. The duration of the cell cycle increases in direct proportion to the size of the wing, leading to linear-like growth during the third instar. Ds-Fat signaling enhances the rate at which the cell cycle lengthens with wing size, thus diminishing the rate of wing growth. We show that this results in a complex but stereotyped relative scaling of wing growth with body growth in Drosophila . Finally, we examine the dynamics of Fat and Ds protein distribution in the wing, observing graded distributions that change during growth. However, the significance of these dynamics is unclear since perturbations in expression have negligible impact on wing growth.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Cellular and Molecular Basis of Disease Training Program

  NIH · $20.6M · 1983–2024

• Non-coding RNAs and their mechanisms and functions-Renewal

  NIH · $6.8M · 2016–2031

• Cancer Research Training and EducationCoordination

  NIH · $51.1M · 1997–2030

• NIH Grant R01EY010111

  NIH · $2.9M · 2006

• NIH Grant R01GM077581

  NIH · $2.9M · 2017

Frequent coauthors

• Nicolás Peláez

  Northwestern University

  24 shared

• Lewis A. Chodosh

  University of Pennsylvania

  22 shared

• Justin J. Cassidy

  20 shared

• Gerald M. Rubin

  Howard Hughes Medical Institute

  17 shared

• Phillip A. Sharp

  Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  15 shared

• Madhav Mani

  Northwestern University

  14 shared

• Kevin Kim

  13 shared

• Ritika Giri

  Northwestern University

  13 shared

Labs

• Carthew LabPI

Education

• Ph.D.

  Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  1987