How Drosophila melanogaster Forms its Mechanoreceptors

Abstract

Abstract:A strictly determined number of external sensory organs, macrochaetes, acting as mechanoreceptors, are orderly located on drosophila head and body. Totally, they form the bristle pattern, which is a species-specific characteristic of drosophila. Each mechanoreceptor comprises four specialized cells derived from the single sensory organ precursor (SOP) cell. The conserved bristle pattern combined with a comparatively simple structure of each mechanosensory organ makes macrochaetes a convenient model for studying the formation spatial structures with a fixed number of elements at certain positions and the mechanism underlying cell differentiation. The macrochaete morphogenesis consists of three stages. At the first stage, the proneural clusters segregate from the massive of ectodermal cells of the wing imaginal disc. At the second stage, the SOP cell is determined and its position in the cluster is specified. At the third stage, the SOP cell undergoes two asymmetric divisions, and the daughter cells differentiate into the components of mechanoreceptor: shaft, socket, bipolar neuron, and sheath. The critical factor determining the neural pathway of cell development is the content of proneural proteins, products of the achaete-scute (AS-C) gene complex, reaching its maximum in the SOP cell. The experimental data on the main genes and their products involved in the control of bristle pattern formation are systematized. The roles of achaete-scute complex, EGFR and Notch signaling pathways, and selector genes in these processes are considered. An integral scheme describing the functioning of the system controlling macrochaete development in D. melanogaster is proposed based on analysis of literature data.

DREF is Critical for Drosophila Bristle Development by Regulating Endoreplication in Shaft Cells

“…(Held, 2002;Furman and Bukharina, 2008) Considering the observation that strong dref-knockdown in SOPs lineage caused deletion of bristles (Fig. 1G), we speculated that missing bristles may result from defects in proper SOP formation.…”

“…Bristle development system has been described as an ideal model to study many biological events (Audibert et al, 2005;Furman and Bukharina, 2008;Tilney and DeRosier, 2005). Since the development of bristles is well-characterized in detail.…”

Origin of Inner Ear Hair Cells: Morphological and Functional Differentiation from Ciliary Cells into Hair Cells in Zebrafish Inner Ear

“…In Drosophila, for instance, a proneural gene, atonal, is critical for the differentiation of the chordotonal organ, including ciliated mechanosensory neurons (Jarman et al, 1993; for review, see Furman and Bukharina, 2008). Expression of a mouse atonal homolog, atoh1, is required for the genesis of hair cells in mice (Bermingham et al, 1999).…”

Drosophila mechanoreceptors as a model for studying asymmetric cell division

“…The mechanisms of SOP cell determination were reviewed earlier (Furman, Bukharina, 2008), so here we will focus on the molecular genetic mechanisms of ACD. (1) ectodermal cells of the wing imaginal disc; (2) proneural cluster (dark gray); (3) proneural cluster with the single SOP cell in its center; pIIa, pIIb, and pIIIb are the daughter cells; (g) glial cell, which undergoes apoptosis; (ne) neuron; (th) thecogen; (tr) trichogen; (to) tormogen; (sf) shaft; (so) socket; (sh) sheath; and (n) bipolar neuron.…”