“…The fusome comprises membrane skeletal proteins such as the α-and β-spectrins, ankyrin, the adducinlike HtsF (the fusome specific product of the hu-li tai shao gene) (Yue and Spradling, 1992), Bam (bag-of-marbles) (McKearin and Ohlstein, 1995), TER94 (León and McKearin, 1999), and motor molecules such as cytoplasmic dynein encoded by the Dhc64C gene (McGrail and Hays, 1997). Mutations in the genes hts (Yue and Spradling, 1992), α-spectrin (de Cuevas et al, 1996), ovarian tumour (King et al, 1978) and Dhc64C (McGrail and Hays, 1997) disrupt the fusome, leading to formation of a cyst with an abnormal number of germ cells and the failure of any cystocyte to acquire oocyte identity. Thus, the fusome is required for the formation of a polarised 16-cell cyst and for oocyte specification, and fulfils this function by its regular and polarised growth throughout the stem cell and cyst cell cycles (Lin et al, 1994;Knowles and Cooley, 1994;Deng and Lin, 1997;de Cuevas and Spradling, 1998;Grieder et al, 2000).…”