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First published online October 30, 2006

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A new twist to LR asymmetry

The establishment of the embryonic axes is a crucial developmental event. Anteroposterior and dorsoventral axis determination is reasonably well understood, but in some organisms the earliest steps of left-right (LR) axis formation remain unclear. Now Danilchik and co-workers describe an intrinsic chirality in the cortex of Xenopus eggs that might predetermine this animal's LR asymmetry (see p. 4517). They report that one-cell Xenopus embryos and parthenogenetically activated eggs undergo a twisting motion in which the animal pole rotates counterclockwise past the vegetal cortex after treatment with 2,3-butanedione monoxime (BDM), which disrupts actinmyosin interactions. BDM treatment, they report, induces a shear zone parallel to the egg's equator in which long actin fibres develop in a microtubule-independent manner, and randomizes the LR orientation of visceral organs in affected tadpoles. The researchers suggest that the consistent chirality of the BDM-induced twisting movement reveals a cryptic asymmetry in the egg's cortical actin cytoskeleton that could play an early role in LR axis determination.

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Related articles in Development:

Intrinsic chiral properties of the Xenopus egg cortex: an early indicator of left-right asymmetry?

Michael V. Danilchik, Elizabeth E. Brown, and Kristen Riegert
Development 2006 133: 4517-4526. [Abstract] [Full Text]  

This Article Full Text (PDF) Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Related articles in Development Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Download to citation manager Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Search for Related Content Social Bookmarking                         What's this?