Work described in this story was made possible in part by federal funding supported by taxpayers. At Harvard Medical School, the future of efforts like this - done in service to humanity - now hangs in the balance due to the government's decision to terminate large numbers of federally funded grants and contracts across Harvard University.
- By CATHERINE CARUSO
During a tour of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, Corey Allard noticed something strange: fish using six leg-like appendages to "walk" around the bottom of their tank.
Allard was intrigued to learn that scientists suspect the appendages are sensory organs that help the fish - called sea robins - feel around in the sand for prey. His intrigue deepened upon discovering that almost nothing was known about sea robins beyond a couple of papers from the 1970s.
Soon, he was studying the bizarre-looking fish.
The encounter started Allard on a research journey that culminated in becoming an assistant professor of cell biology in the Blavatnik Institute at Harvard Medical School. Allard, who launched his lab last fall, takes a curiosity-driven approach to studying a range of species, seeking to reveal basic biological principles - some of which may ultimately have applications for medicine or industry.
In a conversation with Harvard Medicine News, Allard shared more about the value of focusing on unusual organisms, why he's excited to join the faculty of a medical school, and what the field might lose as federal research funding - which has been a source of support for his research - faces an increasingly uncertain future.
Harvard Medicine News: What do you study, and why?
Corey Allard: We study species that have some unusual trait or behavior - something that causes us to pause and wonder how, exactly, it works. Something that challenges our assumptions of biology. Then we try to learn from that species, often in terms of molecules and cells. We ask questions like how the species evolved that trait or behavior and how it functions. In this way, we can get at bigger questions related to neuroscience, evolution, and comparative biology. The long-term goal is to deepen our knowledge of basic biology in ways that help us understand disease and develop new treatments.
Famous physiologist August Krogh developed a principle stating that for any particular scientific question there is an organism ideally suited to studying it. We flip Krogh's principle on its head by making the case that most unusual organisms have something important to teach us.
We have studied lots of unusual species, including cephalopods, sea robins, and more recently, a remarkable lineage of sea slugs. In each case, we've identified a species that we think is useful for asking a question that couldn't be asked with more conventional research organisms such as mice or zebrafish.
HMNews: How did you become interested in unusual animals?
Allard: I've always been fascinated by animals and how they work, but I didn't realize studying animals could be a career until college. As an undergraduate, I volunteered in a lab that studied Antarctic icefish, which are fish that don't have red blood cells - they basically have evolved anemia. We were using the fish to identify genes involved in red blood cell formation. Through this research, I became interested in the strategy of comparative biology and using species with unusual traits to understand biology and medicine - basically looking at extremes or exceptions.
HMNews: What topics can you study by looking at extremes and exceptions?
Allard: There are a range of them. For example, as a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Nicholas Bellono at Harvard University, I studied the organization and function of the nervous system in octopus and squid. These organisms have sophisticated nervous systems that support complex behaviors but are organized in a radically different way than other species - including humans - and thus challenge our understanding of how nervous systems work.
We focused on sensory systems, specifically the sucker cups that octopus and squid have on their arms and tentacles. People have known about sucker cups for a long time, but nobody understood how they worked in terms of sensory function. We asked basic questions, such as what are the sensory receptors in sucker cups? How are these cells hooked up to the nervous system? How do sucker cups mediate behaviors unique to cephalopods?
Using cephalopods to learn about the basic function of nervous systems aligns with our main goal: to discover fundamental principles that can be applied broadly to many species. In doing comparisons between species, we can discover core principles that operate across systems. This is the kind of information that can end up being translated into medicine or industry.
