Understanding the impact of High Sugar Diet on the innate immunity of Drosophila melanogaster

Abstract

The diet of an organism has a significant influence on its health and homeostasis. In globally, Diabetes and related metabolic disorders are emerging health complications. Few reports suggest that diabetic patients have a compromised immune system. Our goal was to understand the impact of High Sugar Diet on the immune system using model organism Drosophila melanogaster. In this study, we provided experimental fly batches 1M sugar to create a high sugar condition compared to Normal Diet concentration which is 0.15M. Our results showed a variation in the blood cell population in the High sugar diet compared to the Normal Diet. On pre-diabetic conditions, flies reared in the High Sugar Diet could not mount an immune response upon infection.