Useful Fly Stuff

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In addition to the lab spaces and services we can provide for Drosophila workers, the Fly Facility also aims to provide other resources for the Drosophila community, both in Cambridge and beyond. We hope to continue to build this section of our website to create a useful resource for researchers, teachers and others. Please let us know if you have suggestions for additional resources that we might include here.

A Basic Training Package for Drosophila Genetics

This four-part training package was developed by John Roote in our Fly Facility and Andreas Prokop at the University of Manchester Fly Facility. It is believed to be the first of its kind and its significance is described in the links below:
The training package consists of:
  • A training manual that introduces key topics including some history of fly research, fly handling, mating schemes, balancer chromosomes and markers, and transgenic technologies. 
  • A practical training session on identifying gender and markers that involves handling real flies under a dissecting microscope.
  • A self-study PowerPoint presentation that guides trainees step-by-step through a Drosophila mating scheme.
  • An opportunity for trainees to design mating schemes reflecting routine tasks in a fly laboratory.

 The Training Package was described in a paper in G3 journal (Roote J, Prokop A. G3 (Bethesda). 2013 Feb;3(2):353-8). Links to the paper and supplementary material are below:

Fly Facility Stock Collection

The Fly Facility is not a stock centre and we do not actively distribute fly stocks. However, we do carry a small collection of stocks which you are welcome to peruse (link below).

We are also happy to help fly researchers from outside of Cambridge to locate hard-to-find stocks by disseminating their stock requests to the Cambridge fly community.

Drosophila Book Collection

We have collection of Drosophila text books and manuals that can be borrowed from the Fly Facility office (115a).