Catherine Hill

Catherine Hill Profile Picture

Catherine A. Hill, Ph.D.
Departments Entomology and Biological Sciences

Contact Info:

hillca@purdue.edu
765-496-6157

Training Group(s):
Microbiology, Immunology and Infectious Diseases
Membrane Biology

Active Mentor - currently hosting PULSe students for laboratory rotations and recruiting PULSe students into the laboratory; serves on preliminary exam committees

Current Research Interests:

Infectious diseases transmitted by mosquitoes and ticks represent significant global threats to public health and biosecurity. We are entering an era in which our ability to control arthropod-borne diseases such as Zika, dengue, malaria and Lyme disease is threatened by increasingly widespread drug and insecticide resistance. The goal of our research program is to develop novel, environmentally benign strategies to control mosquito and tick vectors of disease. Our research combines genomic, computational, molecular and drug discovery approaches to understand the biology of arthropod vectors. Our basic research program investigates how arthropod vectors transmit pathogens and parasites to their vertebrate host. We seek to identify and characterize novel molecular targets for the development of new insecticides and transmission-blocking vaccines. Our aim is to understand the biology and signaling of arthropod G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) and advance these receptors as novel molecular targets for insecticide discovery. Our applied research program uses drug discovery approaches to develop new mode-of-action vector insecticides that are safer for humans and the environment. We work across two PULSe Training Groups – “Immunology and Infectious Diseases” and “Membrane Biology”. On campus research collaborators include Professors Richard Kuhn, Department of Biological Sciences and Val Watts, Medicinal Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology.

Selected Publications:

Hill, C.A., Doyle, T., Nuss, A.B., Ejendal, K.F.K., Meyer, J.M. and Watts, V.J. 2016. Comparative pharmacological characterization of D1-like dopamine receptors from Anopheles gambiae, Aedes aegypti and Culex quinquefasciatus suggests pleiotropic signaling in mosquito vector lineages. Parasites and Vectors. 9, 192.

Grabowski, J.M., Perera, R., Roumani, A.M., Hedrick, V., Inerowicz, H.D., Hill, C.A., and

Kuhn, R.J. 2016. Global protein changes in Langat-infected Ixodes scapularis ISE6 cells: tick energy metabolism and glutaminolysis pathways associated with flavivirus infection. PLoS Negl. Trop. Dis. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pntd.0004180

Van Zee, J., Schlueter, J.A., Schlueter, S., Dixon, P. and Hill, C.A. 2016. Paralog analyses reveal gene duplication events and genes under positive selection in Ixodes scapularis and other ixodid ticks. BMC Genomics. DOI: 10.1186/s12864-015-2314-6

Gulia-Nuss, M., Nuss, A.B., Sonenshine, D.E., Roe, R.M., Waterhouse, R.M., Meyer, J.M., Sattelle, D.B., Ribeiro, J.M., Miller, J.R., Walenz, B.P., Koren, S., Hostetler, J.B., Thiagarajan, M., Joardar, V.S., Hannick, L.I., Bidwell, S., Megy, K., Hammond, M.P., Young, S., Zeng, Q., Walker, J., Bhide, K., Lang, E.G., Thimmapuram, J., Abrudan, J.L., Almeida, F.C., Ayllón, N., Bissinger, B.W., Bonzon-Kulichenko, E., Caffrey, D.R., Caimano, M.J., Croset, V., Driscoll, T., Gilbert, D., Gillespie, J.J., Giraldo-Calderón, G.I., Grabowski, J.M., Jiang, D., Khalil, S.M.S., Kim, D., Kocan, K.M., Koci, J., Kuhn, R.J., Kurtti, T.J., Lang, E.G., Kennedy, R.C., Kwon, H., Perera, R., Qi, Y., Radolf, J.D., Sakamoto, J.M., Sánchez-Gracia, A., Severo, M.S., Silverman, N., Šimo, L., Tojo, M., Tornador, C., Van Zee, J.P., Vázquez, J., Vieira, F.G., Villar, M., Wespiser, A.R., Yang, Y., Zhu, J., Arensburger, P., Pietrantonio, P.V., Barker, S.C., Shao, R., Zdobnov, E.M., Hauser, F., Grimmelikhuijzen, C.J.P., Park, Y., Lees, K., Rozas, J., Benton, R., Pedra, J.H.F., Nelson, D.R., Unger, M.F., Tubio, J.M.C., Tu, Z., Robertson, H.M., , Fuente, J., Shumway, M., Sutton, G., Wortman, J.R., Lawson, D., Wikel, S.K., Nene, V.M., Fraser, C.M., Collins, F.H., Caler, E., Birren, B., Nelson, K.E. and Hill, C.A. 2016. Genomic insights into the Ixodes scapularis tick vector of Lyme disease. Nature Commun. DOI: 10.1038/ncomms10507.

Nuss, A.B., Ejendal, K.F.K., Doyle, T., Lang, E.G., Meyer, J.M., Watts, V.J. and Hill, C.A. 2015. Dopamine receptor antagonists as new mode-of-action insecticide leads for control of Aedes and Culex mosquito vectors. PLoS Negl. Trop. Dis. 9: e0003515.

6Conley, J.M., Meyer, J.M., Nuss, A.B., Doyle, T., Savinov, S., Hill, C.A. and Watts, V.J.

2015. In vitro and in vivo evaluation of AaDOP2 receptor antagonists reveals antidepressants and antipsychotics as novel lead molecules for yellow-fever mosquito control. J. Pharmacol. Exp. Ther. 352: 53-60.

Hill, C.A., Meyer, J.M., Ejendal, K.F.K., Echeverry, D.F., Lang, E.G., Avramova, L.V., Conley, J.M. and Watts, V.J. 2013. Reinvigorating the Insecticide Discovery Pipeline for Vector Control: GPCRs as Targets for the Identification of Next Gen Insecticides. Pesticide Biochem. Physiol. 106, 141-148.

Ejendal, K.F.K., Meyer, J.M., Brust, T., Avramova, L.V., Hill, C.A., and Watts, V.J. 2012. Discovery of potent antagonists of tick dopamine receptors via chemical library screening and comparative pharmacological analyses. Insect Biochem. Mol. Biol. 42, 846-853.

Meyer, J.M., Ejendal, K.F.K., Avramova. L., Garland-Kuntz, E., Giraldo-Calderón, G. Watts, V.J. and Hill, C.A. 2012. A “genome-to-lead” approach for insecticide discovery: pharmacological characterization and chemical compound screening of Aedes aegypti D1-like dopamine receptors. PLoS Negl. Trop. Dis. 6(1): e1478.

Meyer, J.M., Ejendal, K.F.K., Watts, V.J. and Hill, C.A. 2011. Molecular and pharmacological characterization of two D1-like dopamine receptors in the Lyme disease tick, Ixodes scapularis. Insect Biochem. Mol. Biol. 41, 563-571.

Meyer, J.M., Kurtti, T.J., Van Zee, J.P. and Hill, C.A. 2010. Genome organization of major tandem repeats in the hard tick, Ixodes scapularis. Chrom. Res. 18, 357-370.

Nene, V., Wortman, J., Lawson, D., Haas, B., Kodira, C., Tu, Z., Loftus, B., Xi, Z., Megy, K., Gebherr, M., Zdobnov, Y., Lobo, N., Campbell, K., Brown, S., Bonalso, M., Zhu, J., Sinkens, S., Hogenkamp, D., Amedo, P., Arensburger, P., Atkinson, P., Bidwell, S., Biedler, J., Birney, E., Bruggner, R., Costas, J., Coy, M., Crabtree, J., Crawford, M., deBruyn, B., deCaprio, D., Eiglmeier, K., Eisenstadt, E., El-Dorry, H., Gelbart, W., Gomes, S., Hammond, M., Hannick, L., Hogan, J., Holmes, M., Jaffe, D., Kennedy, R., Koo, H., Kravitz, S., Kriventseva, E., Kulp, D., LaButti, K., Lee, E., Li, S., Lovin, D., Mao, C., Mauceli, E., Menck, C., Miller, J., Montgommery, P., Mori, A., Nascimento, A., Naviera, H., Nusbaum, C., O’Leary, S., Orvis, J., Pertea, M., Quesneville, H., Reidenbach, K., Rogers, Y-H., Roth, C., Schneider, J., Schatz, M., Shumway, M., Stanke, M., Stinson, E., Tubio, J., VanZee, J., Verjovski-Almeida, S., Werner, D., White, O., Wyder, S., Zeng, Q., Zhao, Q., Hill, C., Raikhel, A., Soares, M., Knudson, D., Lee, N., Salzberg, S., Paulsenn, I., Dimopoulos, G., Collins, F., Birren, B., Fraser-Ligget, C., Severson, D. 2007. Genome sequence of Aedes aegypti, a major arbovirus vector. Science. 316, 1718-1723.

Hill, C.A., Kafatos, F.C., Stansfield, S. K. and Collins, F. H. 2005. Arthropod-borne diseases: Vector control in the genomics era. Nature Rev. Microbiol. 3, 262-8.

Hill, C.A., Fox, A.N., Pitts, R.J., Kent, L.B., Tan, P.L., Chrystal, M.A., Cravchik, A., Collins, F.H., Robertson, H.M. and Zweibel, L. J. 2002. G protein-coupled receptors in Anopheles gambiae. Science. 298, 176-178.

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