First published online October 24, 2008
Development 135, 2202e (2008)
© The Company of Biologists Limited
How flies burst into a crawl
The development of proper motor functions is critical to the survival of
most animals, but how are stereotypical movement patterns, such as walking and
breathing, first generated and then refined? On
p. 3707, Sarah Crisp
and colleagues report that the first muscle contractions seen in
Drosophila embryos are generated by spontaneous activity in the
muscle cells themselves. However, a drastic change in the pattern of muscle
contraction later takes place, with simultaneous bursts of activity occurring
in numerous muscles on both sides of the embryo. This transition, the authors
find, requires motor, but not sensory, activity, which consists not of the
spontaneous firing of individual motoneurons, but rather of the activity of a
developing central, pattern-generating motor network. Following the onset of
this activity, the muscle contraction pattern that occurs during these bursts
begins increasingly to resemble that of crawling larvae. As such, the authors
propose that these activity bursts are important for the maturation and
development of the central motor network and for coordinated movement.
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Related articles in Development:
- The development of motor coordination in Drosophila embryos
- Sarah Crisp, Jan Felix Evers, André Fiala, and Michael Bate
Development 2008 135: 3707-3717.
[Abstract]
[Full Text]
