QUICK SEARCH:   [advanced] Author: Keyword(s):
Home     Help     Feedback     Subscriptions     Archive     Search     Table of Contents

First published online 17 September 2009
doi: 10.1242/dev.037226

This Article Figures Only Full Text Full Text (PDF) Supplementary Material All Versions of this Article: dev.037226v1 136/20/3433    most recent Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Google Scholar Articles by Kumar, A. Articles by Reichert, H. PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Kumar, A. Articles by Reichert, H. Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Lineage-specific cell death in postembryonic brain development of Drosophila

Biozentrum, University of Basel, Klingelbergstrasse 50, CH-4056 Basel, Switzerland.

^* Author for correspondence (heinrich.reichert{at}unibas.ch)

Accepted 14 August 2009

The Drosophila central brain is composed of thousands of neurons that derive from approximately 100 neuroblasts per hemisphere. Functional circuits in the brain require precise neuronal wiring and tight control of neuronal numbers. How this accurate control of neuronal numbers is achieved during neural development is largely unclear. Specifically, the role of programmed cell death in control of cell numbers has not been studied in the central brain neuroblast lineages. Here, we focus on four postembryonic neuroblast lineages in the central brain identified on the basis that they express the homeobox gene engrailed (en). For each lineage, we determine the total number of adult-specific neurons generated as well as number and pattern of en-expressing cells. We then demonstrate that programmed cell death has a pronounced effect on the number of cells in the four lineages; approximately half of the immature adult-specific neurons in three of the four lineages are eliminated by cell death during postembryonic development. Moreover, we show that programmed cell death selectively affects en-positive versus en-negative cells in a lineage-specific manner and, thus, controls the relative number of en-expressing neurons in each lineage. Furthermore, we provide evidence that Notch signaling is involved in the regulation of en expression. Based on our findings, we conclude that lineage-specific programmed cell death plays a prominent role in the generation of neuronal number and lineage diversity in the Drosophila brain.

Key words: Drosophila, Brain, engrailed, Cell death, Lineage, Neuroblast, Stem cell, Notch

CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?