Early Drosophila Embryogenesis

[firebird_88]

Haven't seen a tag for this so I assume it hasn't been posted before. ^^; I hail from a lab that does work with Drosophila melanogaster (also known as the common fruit fly) and it's fascinating to watch their embryos develop before my eyes.

Unlike most animals, fruit flies embryos undergo superficial meroblastic (incomplete) cleavage and become

Comments

[davegodfrey]

How widespread is this in flies and other insects? Does it correlate with particular lifestyles or is it restricted to particular groups?

[twisby]

i have actually seen this type of embryonic division (not in real-time, but sped up over 24 hours) in mice.

[firebird_88]

Actually, I doubt that, since most mammals undergo complete cleavage from the beginning (though all the cells may divide synchronously and that might be what you're seeing.) Do you still have the link to that video?

[twisby]

I saw it at Northwestern University when I was touring the facilities for their 2 photon electron microscope, so it's not online.

[trompelol]

I think this is quite possibly the best post WTF_Nature has ever had.

[sarig]

This is just wicked cool. Now I want to play Zerglings again!

[blasphemusfish]

Thanks for posting this, totally makes for top quality wtf_nature xD

[firebird_88]

Welcome! :3 I actually worried that it was too geeky and maybe not interesting enough considering some of the other posts here. ^^;

[blasphemusfish]

Oh no not at all, the geekier the better xD

[logansrogue]

Are you kidding? This is fucking fantastic!

[cindysaurus_rex]

These movies are awesome. What aspect of development does your lab work on?

[firebird_88]

Unfortunately they're not mine 'cause I'm not allowed to share unprinted/unpublished material from my lab, but I'm glad you like them! We're actually studying the Wnt pathway, which both Drosophila and humans share. Studies show that mutations in the Wnt pathway are present in 80% of colon cancer patients, so we're basically messing with the pathway in Drosophila and seeing what we get. (So yes, we're evil human beings and we're giving the flies cancer. ^^; )

My own project deals more with adult flies, but the Wnt pathway is involved in development as well, so some of the older graduate students and the professor make movies about early embryo development. They basically knock out parts of the pathway and see what happens to the pretty, synchronous nuclear divisions that you wee above. ^^

[cindysaurus_rex]

Sounds like a really neat lab. I love signal transduction. But since genes like Wnt are involved in so many pathways, and in different ways in different tissues...I think I'll stick to studying prokaryotes :) Can't give bacteria cancer! (Though bleaching a culture is really mass genocide, haha)

So props for working on a eukaryotic model. And thanks for sharing!

[firebird_88]

That's part of the problem, every member (or close to every member) is working on a different aspect of the pathway. XD Most of our projects involve some part of the protein APC2, which seems to be one of the major factors for (possibly) causing cancer, but APC2 is involved in everything from wing formation to the pseudo cleavage furrowed needed for the nuclear divisions from the videos to like... a zillion other things. XD

Actually, I love working with prokaryotes too, though most of my experience is with E.coli. (LOL Phhht, you don't even have to go through so much trouble to kill a culure, you can just turn up the incubator and bake them. <--Has done this before. Accidently. << >>; )