Fig. 5. Metasynchronous mitoses in blastoderm cycles. TPLSM images of a live embryo showing that, at cycle 12, interphase is longer in the middle region than at the posterior pole. Nuclei at the posterior region enter interphase (A, arrows) 40 seconds earlier than nuclei in the middle region (B, arrows). (C) Nuclei at the posterior region enter prophase, whereas nuclei in the middle enter prophase 90 seconds later (D). In this particular embryo, interphase in the middle region is 50 seconds longer than in the posterior region. (E) Mean values of regional differences of cell-cycle-phase durations in histone-GFP embryos at cycle 11 (n=36) and cycle 12 (n=17), showing that interphase and total cycle are longer in the middle region than the posterior region. Scale bar: 50 µm.