Statements in which the resource exists as a subject.
PredicateObject
rdf:type
lifeskim:mentions
pubmed:issue
10
pubmed:dateCreated
1999-6-30
pubmed:abstractText
The adult peripheral nervous system of Drosophila includes a complex array of mechanosensory organs (bristles) that cover much of the body surface of the fly. The four cells (shaft, socket, sheath, and neuron) which compose each of these organs adopt distinct fates as a result of cell-cell signaling via the Notch (N) pathway. However, the specific mechanisms by which these cells execute their conferred fates are not well understood. Here we show that D-Pax2, the Drosophila homolog of the vertebrate Pax2 gene, has an essential role in the differentiation of the shaft cell. In flies bearing strong loss-of-function mutations in the shaven function of D-Pax2, shaft structures specifically fail to develop. Consistent with this, we find that D-Pax2 protein is expressed in all cells of the bristle lineage during the mitotic (cell fate specification) phase of bristle development, but becomes sharply restricted to the shaft and sheath cells in the post-mitotic (differentiative) phase. Two lines of evidence described here indicate that D-Pax2 expression and function is at least in part downstream of cell fate specification mechanisms such as N signaling. First, we find that the lack of late D-Pax2 expression in the socket cell (the sister of the shaft cell) is controlled by N pathway activity; second, we find that loss of D-Pax2 function is epistatic to the socket-to-shaft cell fate transformation caused by reduced N signaling. Finally, we show that misexpression of D-Pax2 is sufficient to induce the production of ectopic shaft structures. From these results, we propose that D-Pax2 is a high-level transcriptional regulator of the shaft cell differentiation program, and acts downstream of the N signaling pathway as a specific link between cell fate determination and cell differentiation in the bristle lineage.
pubmed:grant
pubmed:language
eng
pubmed:journal
pubmed:citationSubset
IM
pubmed:chemical
pubmed:status
MEDLINE
pubmed:month
May
pubmed:issn
0950-1991
pubmed:author
pubmed:issnType
Print
pubmed:volume
126
pubmed:owner
NLM
pubmed:authorsComplete
Y
pubmed:pagination
2261-72
pubmed:dateRevised
2007-11-14
pubmed:meshHeading
pubmed:year
1999
pubmed:articleTitle
An essential role for the Drosophila Pax2 homolog in the differentiation of adult sensory organs.
pubmed:affiliation
Department of Biology, University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093-0349, USA.
pubmed:publicationType
Journal Article, Research Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S., Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S., Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't