Energy for life

Jasmin Imran Alsous (graduate student), Stanislav Shvartsman (faculty)

Chemical & Biological Engineering

Each tiny egg of the common fruit fly matures inside the ovaries of the female fly over the course of about three days. In that short time, the egg’s chamber grows 5000-fold (imagine a small balloon inflating into the size of a large house over a long weekend!). Here stained in green we see mitochondria, which are the powerhouse of the cell and supply the energy required for growth and maturation of the egg. This filtered image was taken with a confocal microscope.