Trump's Harvard cuts threaten a giant in the biomedical research community: A database about the tiny fruit fly

For more than a century, the humble fruit fly has paved the way for many critical scientific breakthroughs.

For more than a century, the humble fruit fly has paved the way for many critical scientific breakthroughs.

This tiny insect helped researchers figure out that X-rays can cause genetic mutations. That genes are passed on from parent to child through chromosomes. That a gene called period helps our bodies keep time — and that disruptions to that internal clock can lead to jet lag and increased risk for neurological and metabolic diseases.

Those discoveries, along with nearly 90,000 other studies, are part of a key online database called FlyBase that researchers routinely use to help them more quickly design new experiments. These tests explore the underlying causes of disease and could help with the development of new treatments. Science builds on prior insights, and a handy repository of past advances serves as kindling for future discoveries.

The website receives about 770,000 page views each month from scientists working around the world on developing personalized therapies for rare cancers, modeling human neurodegenerative diseases and screening drug candidates for conditions like Alzheimer’s.

Now, that critical resource is on the brink of layoffs that endanger its future and ability to make research more efficient.