Drosophila Flashcards
What is a holometabolous life cycle?
The insect undergoes complete metamorphosis. The larval forms look completely different than the adults
What is hemimetabolous life cycle?
The insect undergoes incomplete metamorphosis. The larval form looks like a mini adult
Do flies have a holometabolous or hemimetabolous life cycle?
Holometabolous
What effects do the nurse and follicle cells have on the embryo during oogenesis?
The nurse and follicle cells determine the egg and embryo axes by producing oskar and bicoid mRNA. The follicle cells also produce paracrine and juxtacrine signals
What type of yolk distribution do fly eggs have?
Centrolecithal
What type of cleavage do flies have?
Superficial. Karyokinesis occurs without cytokinesis, so the embryo is syncytial
What happens for the first 11 divisions?
Karyokinesis without cytokinesis
What happens after the 9th division?
The nuclei migrate to the outer cytoplasm of the embryo
What happens at the 12 division?
The nuclei are segregated into individual cells and form the cellular blastoderm
How does the cellular blastoderm form?
Microtubules grow from the outer cytoplasm towards the yolk, and actin filaments pinch off the new cells
What three proteins work to cause the midblastula transition?
Smaug, Zelda, and cyclin regulators
What does Smaug do? Where does it come from?
Accumulates over time and destroys maternal mRNA. Is a maternal signal
What does Zelda do? Where does it come from?
Regulates transcription by allowing the chromatin to unwind for transcription to occur. Is a maternal signal
What do cyclin regulators do?
Regulate how long each cell division takes
Where does gastrulation occur?
The ventral furrow
What is the ventral furrow?
An invagination of future mesoderm cells that eventually closes to form a tube
Where does the endoderm tissue come from during gastrulation?
Anterior and posterior pockets
Where is the neural ectoderm during gastrulation?
Surrounding the ventral furrow
How does the germ band expand over the posterior end of the embryo?
Convergent extension
How are the different segments of the larva created during gastrulation?
Convergent extension of the germ band over the posterior end of the embryo, which then contracts back to its original position and leaves the segments together in the correct places
What are the segments found on a fly larvae?
8 abdominal segments (A1-A8), 3 thoracic segments (T1-T3) and 3 head segments
How do the germ cells get inside the embryo?
Invagination of endoderm tissue
What are imaginal disks?
Discs of tissue in the larva that give rise to corresponding adult features
How does syncytial specification work?
Cytoplasmic signals with different locations in the cytoplasm as a gradient
What 3 maternal signals establish the anterior-posterior axis in the oocyte?
Bicoid, oskar, nanos