Establishment and Maintenance of the P Cytotype Associated With Telomeric P Elements in Drosophila melanogaster

Corresponding author: Michael J. Simmons, Cell Biology and Development, 250 BioScience Center, 1445 Gortner Ave., University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN 55108-1095., simmo004{at}umn.edu (E-mail)

Communicating editor: R. S. HAWLEY

P elements inserted near the left telomere of the X chromosome are associated with the P cytotype, a maternally transmitted condition that strongly regulates the activity of the P transposon family in some strains of Drosophila. The regulatory abilities of two such elements, TP5 and TP6, are stable in homozygous stocks over many generations. However, these regulatory abilities are attenuated when the telomeric P elements are transmitted through heterozygous females, and they are utterly lost when the elements are transmitted through males. Paternally transmitted telomeric P elements reacquire regulatory ability when they pass through a female germ line. This reacquisition is enhanced if the females in which it occurs came from mothers who carried a telomeric P element. The enhancement has two components: (1) a strictly maternal effect that is transmitted to the females independently of the mother's telomeric P element ("presetting" or the "pre-P cytotype") and (2) a zygotic effect associated with inheritance of the mother's telomeric P element. One telomeric P element can enhance the reacquisition of another's regulatory ability. When X chromosomes that carry telomeric P elements are extracted through males and made homozygous by using a balancer chromosome, most of the resulting stocks develop strong regulatory abilities in a few generations. However, some of the stocks do not attain the regulatory ability of the original population.

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