D3161: Live-bearing cockroaches as a model system to understand heat impacts on pregnancy

Extreme climate events such heat waves are becoming increasingly prevalent, with an impact on multiple biological processes including mortality and reproduction, across a range of species. In viviparous (live-bearing) species, elevated temperatures have been associated with adverse pregnancy outcomes such as preterm birth, stillbirth, and low birth weight. Despite numerous studies focusing on associations between heat events and adverse outcomes, the underlying mechanisms, such as the proteomic, transcriptomic and metabolic aspect, of these associations remain largely unexplored. Moreover, less is known about how the type and severity of outcome depends on the timing in pregnancy when the heatwave was experienced.

This project aims to study the potential underlying physiological mechanism connecting heat events and adverse pregnancy outcomes, and how these depend on timing in pregnancy, using experiments on a model insect and analysis of human data, such as birth rates in relation to temperature and proteomic and transcriptomic data from tissue samples. Here, I present my methodology of experimentally simulating heatwaves in the laboratory and testing the outcomes when experienced early or late in pregnancy through using the viviparous cockroach Diploptera punctata. Outcomes of interest include gestational length, abortion rates, brood size and offspring phenotypical variables.

By bridging data from the cockroach experimental approach and human data analysis, this project aims to suggest future impacts on adverse pregnancy outcomes as well as aid to develop adaptation strategies.