Funding Wild Ideas that Lead to Transformative Discoveries
Jim (BS '62, MS '63) and Charlotte Cordes have established the Cordes Wild Idea Research Fund to help fill the gap in critical support of early-stage research.
California's citrus trees are facing an existential threat—not from urban expansion or wildfires but from a tiny insect spreading a deadly disease. While feeding on the citrus leaves the Asian citrus psyllid, roughly the size of an aphid, transmits a bacteria that kills. "This insect and the bacteria it carries have completely destroyed the Florida citrus industry. And it is now in California," says Professor of Biology Bruce Hay. "The goal is to find ways to suppress the citrus psyllid population or eliminate it before the disease spreads."
Hay's research explores genome modifications that could lead to such potential outcomes as the removal of pest species. The traditional approach to insect transgenesis, which introduces foreign DNA into an insect's genome by way of injection into insect eggs, is technically challenging and in some species can't be done at all. As a result, Hay and graduate student Thomas Adamo Schmidt are pursuing a novel method that focuses on modifying the adult female insect instead. By using a virus to target the adult insect's unfertilized eggs, it could potentially stop an invasive population from growing.
"Bruce's proposal exemplifies the vision behind the fund: supporting bold, unconventional ideas with the potential to lead to transformative discoveries."
Paul Sternberg, Bren Professor of Biology; William K. Bowes Jr. Leadership Chair, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering
Their research is the first project supported by the new Cordes Wild Idea Research Fund established by Jim (BS '62, MS '63) and Charlotte Cordes. The fund will support one faculty member within the Division of Biology and Biological Engineering annually, including helping to fund students and postdoctoral scholars, purchase tools and supplies, and invest in other aspects of the research.
"This is precisely the type of early-stage, high-risk research that is often difficult to support through conventional funding mechanisms," says Paul Sternberg, the William K. Bowes Jr. Leadership Chair for the division. "The flexibility provided by the Cordes Wild Idea Research Fund will allow Bruce's team to generate the critical preliminary data needed to pursue substantially larger external grants and further advance this promising work."
Supporting Curiosity for the Unexplored
"I have always appreciated the outstanding education I received at Caltech," says Jim, who is now retired from Raytheon after decades working in the defense industry. "It has served me well throughout my career."
He also points to the financial support and learning opportunities that came from working as a research assistant for Gilbert McCann (PhD '39), which also contributed to his success. At that time, McCann was conducting research on houseflies, capturing data from the insects' individual neurons as they responded to visual signals that were then fed into a computer.
"I attached numbered tabs to the backs of flies so they could be connected to a torque meter, wings free and feet dangling," recalls Jim. "Then we digitally recorded and analyzed their flight response to various visual stimuli." McCann's work would help develop the direct analog computer and create a computer program, NASTRAN, that is widely used to analyze aerospace structures.
Charlotte, a retired biology teacher, managed a college's foundation giving program for many years which gave her a unique insight into the challenges of securing financial support. "Often research funding is restricted to projects with an established track record," she says. "We wanted to help those at Caltech who were at the very beginning of their work, curious about something unexplored and yet needing financial support to generate critical preliminary data."
After a conversation with Sternberg, the Bren Professor of Biology, the couple was inspired by his enthusiasm. "We wanted to establish a fund to help explore some 'wild ideas,'" says Charlotte. Charlotte and Jim are parents to sons John and Jay. John (BS '89) and his wife Linda (BS '88) continue the family's ties to Caltech.
Expanding the Boundaries of Discovery
"This is quite a wild idea, and so it seemed like the perfect fit," says Adamo Schmidt of their Cordes fund proposal. A self-described collector of insects as a child, Adamo Schmidt pursued his graduate studies at Caltech in part because of Hay's research.
"I was always the butterfly net kid," he says, "As an undergraduate, I became an advocate for ideas around genetic diversity and gene drive. So when I was looking for graduate work, I was interested in working for a lab that did those kinds of projects."
When Hay first arrived at Caltech, his work centered on cell death and immunity in insects. This led to the challenge of preventing mosquito-borne diseases like malaria and yellow fever. Hay recalls noticing a trend in scientific papers that would frequently end by lamenting a lack of a solution to prevent mosquitos from transmitting diseases.
"So we got interested in that question," says Hay. "How can we manipulate wild populations genetically, so that we can either suppress them directly or change their genetics so that they're unable to transmit whatever disease they're transmitting and still leave the population intact as opposed to trying to eliminate it."
It is that work that ultimately led to their "wild idea" of focusing on the adult female insect which provides a larger target than insect eggs, thus making access easier. What's more, injecting eggs often causes high mortality rates because the needle can damage developing embryos. Instead, the team is proposing using a large insect DNA virus called a baculovirus that can target the female insect's developing eggs. The goal would be to achieve a high level of transgenesis in the offspring.
"Bruce's proposal exemplifies the vision behind the fund: supporting bold, unconventional ideas with the potential to lead to transformative discoveries," says Sternberg. "What made this proposal stand out is not only its originality, but also its potential for broad impact. There were a good number of superb proposals that are highly worthy of support so I wish we had more resources to fund those too."