Schoolchildren in the UK have joined a global experiment run by Stanford University, USA, and the University of Oxford, UK, using fruit flies to answer biomedical research questions.
The project, called Stan-X, will guide the students of Haileybury school, UK, as they design experiments using fruit flies, with the aim of showing the students how research is designed and carried out in a more realistic way than is usually possible in the classroom.
The students will use the flies to help further the understanding of how genetic diseases, such as diabetes and some cancers are passed on by visualising glow-in-the-dark proteins bred into the flies.
The Stan-X project has been running at schools in the US, but this is the first school in Europe to be selected.