- THIS ARTICLE
- Full Text
- Full Text (PDF)
-
All Versions of this Article:
genetics.105.052431v1
173/2/727 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
- Reprints & Permissions
- CITING ARTICLES
- Citing Articles via HighWire
- Citing Articles via Google Scholar
- GOOGLE SCHOLAR
- Articles by Clark, M. E.
- Articles by Karr, T. L.
- Search for Related Content
- PUBMED
- PubMed Citation
- Articles by Clark, M. E.
- Articles by Karr, T. L.
Originally published as Genetics Published Articles Ahead of Print on February 19, 2006.
Genetics, Vol. 173, 727-734, June 2006, Copyright © 2006
doi:10.1534/genetics.105.052431
Induced Paternal Effects Mimic Cytoplasmic Incompatibility in Drosophila
Michael E. Clark1, Benjamin D. Heath1, Cort L. Anderson2 and Timothy L. Karr3
University of Chicago, Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, Chicago, Illinois 60637
3 Corresponding author: University of Bath, Department of Biology and Biochemistry, 4 South Claverton Down, Bath BA2 7AY, United Kingdom.
E-mail: t.l.karr{at}bath.ac.uk
Wolbachia is an intracellular microbe found in a wide diversity of arthropod and filarial nematode hosts. In arthropods these common bacteria are reproductive parasites that manipulate central elements of their host's reproduction to increase their own maternal transmission in one of several ways. Cytoplasmic incompatibility (CI) is one such manipulation where sperm are somehow modified in infected males and this modification must be rescued by the presence of the same bacterial strain in the egg for normal development to proceed. The molecular mechanisms involved in the expression of CI are unknown. Here we show that Wolbachia infection results in increased mRNA and protein expression of the Drosophila simulans nonmuscle myosin II gene zipper. Induced overexpression of zipper in Wolbachia-free transgenic D. melanogaster males results in paternal-effect lethality that mimics the fertilization defects associated with CI. Likewise, overexpression of the tumor suppressor gene, lethal giant larvae [l(2)gl], results in egg lethality and a CI phenotype. Stoichiometric levels of zipper and l(2)gl are required for proper segregation of cellular determinants during neuroblast stem cell division. Taken together these results form the basis of a working hypothesis whereby Wolbachia induces paternal effects in sperm by manipulating the expression of key regulators of cytoskeletal activity during spermatogenesis.
This article has been cited by other articles:
 |
|
 |
|
  B. A. Pannebakker, B. Loppin, C. P. H. Elemans, L. Humblot, and F. Vavre Parasitic inhibition of cell death facilitates symbiosis PNAS, January 2, 2007; 104(1): 213 - 215. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|