Graduation Year
2026
Date of Submission
4-2026
Document Type
Open Access Senior Thesis
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Department
Neuroscience
Second Department
W.M. Keck Science Department
Reader 1
Sandra Watson
Reader 2
Darin Brown
Rights Information
© 2026 Yohanan L Brown
Abstract
Parkinson Disease is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that causes dopaminergic neurons to die. This in turns causes the body to have a decrease in dopamine levels leading to symptoms like motor control issues or sleep disturbances. The main drug that is used to combat these symptoms is levodopa/carbidopa(LDC). LDC helps to facilitate and increase dopamine neurotransmitter release. However, long-term usage of LDC leads to L-DOPA induced dyskinesia (LID)accumulating evidence indicating that LID is primarily caused by the development of sensitized dopamine D1 receptors. To better understand how LDC affects our dopamine receptors the researchers used Drosophila melanogaster to understand how prolonged administration of LDC affects dopamine receptor expression and impacts sleep and locomotor behavior to better understand the development of LID. This study used Dop1R1, Dop1R2, and Dop2R receptor mutants along with CantonS flies as the comparison group. These flies were fed LDC or 3% sucrose vehiclewood. Both Drosophila Activity Monitors (DAMs) and PCR were used to assay the impact of LDC on dopamine receptors and behavior. While the data from the results were not fully conclusive they suggest that the D1-like receptors are the main receptors that are being affected. From this we suggest future studies testing how gene expression changes as the fruit flies take LDC.
Recommended Citation
Brown, Yohanan L. III; Watson, Sandra PhD; and Brown, Darin, "Understanding Parkinson’s Disease: How levodopa/carbidopa affect the dopamine receptor of Drosophila Melanogaster" (2026). CMC Senior Theses. 4188.
https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/4188
