Skip to main content
PMC home page
Genetics logoLink to Genetics
. 1995 Jun;140(2):549–555. doi: 10.1093/genetics/140.2.549

Temporal Patterns of Gene Expression in the Antenna of the Adult Drosophila Melanogaster

S L Helfand 1, K J Blake 1, B Rogina 1, M D Stracks 1, A Centurion 1, B Naprta 1
PMCID: PMC1206634  PMID: 7498736

Abstract

The time course of gene expression in the adult fruit fly has been partially characterized by using enhancer trap and reporter gene constructs that mark 49 different genes. The relative intensity of the reporter protein in individual cells of the antennae was measured as a function of adult age. Most genes showed a graduated expression, and the intensity of expression had a reproducible and characteristic time course. Different genes displayed different temporal patterns of expression and more often than not the pattern of expression was complex. We found a number of genes having patterns that scaled with life span. In these cases the intensity of gene expression was found to be invariant with respect to biological time, when expressed as a fraction of the life span of the line. The scaling was observed even when life span was varied as much as threefold. Such scaling serves to (1) further demonstrate that deterministic mechanisms such as gene regulation act to generate the temporal patterns of expression seen during adult life, (2) indicate that control of these regulatory mechanisms is linked to life span, and (3) suggest mechanisms by which this control is accomplished. We have concluded that gene expression in the adult fly is often regulated in a fashion that allows for graduated expression over time, and that the regulation itself is changing throughout adult life according to some prescribed program or algorithm.

Full Text

The Full Text of this article is available as a PDF (4.6 MB).

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

  1. Arking R., Dudas S. P. Review of genetic investigations into the aging processes of Drosophila. J Am Geriatr Soc. 1989 Aug;37(8):757–773. doi: 10.1111/j.1532-5415.1989.tb02240.x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  2. Bier E., Vaessin H., Shepherd S., Lee K., McCall K., Barbel S., Ackerman L., Carretto R., Uemura T., Grell E. Searching for pattern and mutation in the Drosophila genome with a P-lacZ vector. Genes Dev. 1989 Sep;3(9):1273–1287. doi: 10.1101/gad.3.9.1273. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  3. Boynton S., Tully T. latheo, a new gene involved in associative learning and memory in Drosophila melanogaster, identified from P element mutagenesis. Genetics. 1992 Jul;131(3):655–672. doi: 10.1093/genetics/131.3.655. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  4. Bozcuk A. N. DNA synthesis in the absence of somatic cell division associated with ageing in Drosophila subobscura. Exp Gerontol. 1972 Jun;7(3):147–156. doi: 10.1016/0531-5565(72)90022-8. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  5. Freeman M. First, trap your enhancer. Curr Biol. 1991 Dec;1(6):378–381. doi: 10.1016/0960-9822(91)90199-7. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  6. Glaser R. L., Lis J. T. Multiple, compensatory regulatory elements specify spermatocyte-specific expression of the Drosophila melanogaster hsp26 gene. Mol Cell Biol. 1990 Jan;10(1):131–137. doi: 10.1128/mcb.10.1.131. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  7. Jack J., Dorsett D., Delotto Y., Liu S. Expression of the cut locus in the Drosophila wing margin is required for cell type specification and is regulated by a distant enhancer. Development. 1991 Nov;113(3):735–747. doi: 10.1242/dev.113.3.735. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  8. Kassis J. A., Noll E., VanSickle E. P., Odenwald W. F., Perrimon N. Altering the insertional specificity of a Drosophila transposable element. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 1992 Mar 1;89(5):1919–1923. doi: 10.1073/pnas.89.5.1919. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  9. Lis J. T., Simon J. A., Sutton C. A. New heat shock puffs and beta-galactosidase activity resulting from transformation of Drosophila with an hsp70-lacZ hybrid gene. Cell. 1983 Dec;35(2 Pt 1):403–410. doi: 10.1016/0092-8674(83)90173-3. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  10. Mismer D., Rubin G. M. Analysis of the promoter of the ninaE opsin gene in Drosophila melanogaster. Genetics. 1987 Aug;116(4):565–578. doi: 10.1093/genetics/116.4.565. [DOI] [PMC free article] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  11. Orr W. C., Sohal R. S. Extension of life-span by overexpression of superoxide dismutase and catalase in Drosophila melanogaster. Science. 1994 Feb 25;263(5150):1128–1130. doi: 10.1126/science.8108730. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  12. Richardson A., Butler J. A., Rutherford M. S., Semsei I., Gu M. Z., Fernandes G., Chiang W. H. Effect of age and dietary restriction on the expression of alpha 2u-globulin. J Biol Chem. 1987 Sep 15;262(26):12821–12825. [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  13. Riesgo-Escovar J., Woodard C., Gaines P., Carlson J. Development and organization of the Drosophila olfactory system: an analysis using enhancer traps. J Neurobiol. 1992 Oct;23(8):947–964. doi: 10.1002/neu.480230803. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  14. Song C. S., Rao T. R., Demyan W. F., Mancini M. A., Chatterjee B., Roy A. K. Androgen receptor messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) in the rat liver: changes in mRNA levels during maturation, aging, and calorie restriction. Endocrinology. 1991 Jan;128(1):349–356. doi: 10.1210/endo-128-1-349. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  15. Trout W. E., Kaplan W. D. A relation between longevity, metabolic rate, and activity in shaker mutants of Drosophila melanogaster. Exp Gerontol. 1970 Apr;5(1):83–92. doi: 10.1016/0531-5565(70)90033-1. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]
  16. Yao K. M., White K. Neural specificity of elav expression: defining a Drosophila promoter for directing expression to the nervous system. J Neurochem. 1994 Jul;63(1):41–51. doi: 10.1046/j.1471-4159.1994.63010041.x. [DOI] [PubMed] [Google Scholar]

Articles from Genetics are provided here courtesy of Oxford University Press

RESOURCES