The unique and complex structure of neurons poses the question of how homeostasis is maintained over the long distances that may separate the cell body from its axonal terminus (sometimes up to 1 metre!). Particularly, it gives rise to the question: how is this compartment grown during nervous system development, re-grown following injury and continually maintained during adulthood? My PhD focuses on the latter part of that question. Specifically, I am interested whether local translation of mRNAs could be involved, this phenomenon is well established in developing and regenerating neurons, but little research has investigated whether it is involved in sensory neuron homeostasis. As well as this, I want to investigate the role of the 3’UTR in this process and look at whether this region of the mRNA transcript is involved in regulating local translation in the axons, both during homeostasis and regeneration.