People

My primary research interests are animal-microbial symbioses and nutritional physiology.

I joined Cornell University in 2008 as the Daljit S. and Elaine Sarkaria Professor of Insect Physiology and Toxicology. Before that, I was a member of faculty at the University of York, UK (1996 senior lecturer, 1999 reader, 2003 professor); a Royal Society University Research Fellow (1986-1996); and I did postdoctoral research at the University of Oxford and University of East Anglia. I obtained a PhD at the University of Aberdeen, UK (1981) and BA (zoology) at the University of Oxford, UK (1978). My CV is available here Angela Douglas CV December 2009-2024

The three current research foci in the laboratory are:

Drosophila-gut microbe interactions. We are investigating the composition of the gut microbiota by molecular and microbiological methods, and how the presence and composition of the microbiota interacts with the nutritional condition and immunological function of the insect. This association is a valuable model for many aspects of human-gut microbe interactions. Metabolic coevolution in cooperative symbioses. We are investigating how the metabolic networks of the animal host and microbial symbionts are structured for nutrient exchange by genome analysis, metabolic modeling and metabolic experiments. Our primary focus is essential amino acid synthesis in associations between plant sap feeding insects and their bacterial symbionts.

Novel targets for insect pest control. We harness our fundamental research to identify molecular processes essential for the function of insect pests, and strategies to target these processes. Our research includes interference with the function of insect sugar processing genes and symbiosis-related genes in phloem-feeding insect pests, together with optimization of RNAi to target molecular processes in the insects.