Edward Arthur Kravitz

George Packer Berry Professor of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School. Fruit flies and aggression: For many years his laboratory has been examining the role of amine neurons in aggression using a lobster model system. Recently the major focus shifted from studies of aggression using lobsters as a model organism to the examination of fighting behavior using common strains of the fruit fly, Drosophila melanogaster. Although not widely known, both male and female fruit flies do fight and males at least become territorial (establish dominance relationships). With the genome fully sequenced and with elegant methods available for the selective manipulation of genes in subsets of central nervous system neurons, behavioral studies of aggression in flies offer a powerful experimental system for identifying the fundamental mechanisms underlying this behavior. Experiments underway in the laboratory at this time are using the GAL4/UAS system to turn amine neurons on and off while flies are fighting, and are using differences in fighting behavior between males and females to identify genes involved in laying down patterns of behavior in nervous systems. By combining the information they gather from genetic studies in flies with physiological and single cell molecular studies in lobsters, they hope to take advantage of the best that each system has to offer in order to gather further insight into and understanding of the biological basis of aggression. Has long-standing interests in education. He teaches a graduate course on The Neurobiology of Disease and participates in ethics discussion groups for graduate students at Harvard Medical School. Has served as the director of the Neurobiology Course at the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA, was the co-founder and first chairman of the Neurobiology of Disease Teaching Workshops at the Society for Neuroscience, and the founder and first director of the highly successful graduate Program in Neuroscience at Harvard University. Committed to the education of minorities in the sciences and medicine, and has worked with Native American, Black and Hispanic students and student groups at Harvard, at the Marine Biological Laboratory, and at his alma mater, City College of New York. Has lectured to high school students at the Society for Neuroscience annual meeting, and works with Project Success (for minority high school students) at Harvard Medical School.