The gonad and lin-3/EGF promote the competence of P5.p, P6.p, and P7.p. (A) An L3 “Pn.pxx-stage” cwn-1;egl-20;arIs99 hermaphrodite; lines point to VPC nuclei labeled with GFP, indicating that they have fused with hyp7 (here, P3.p, P4.p, and P5.p fused with hyp7; P6.p and P7.p adopted vulval fates; and P8.p adopted the 3° fate). (B) Individual cwn-1;egl-20;arIs99 hermaphrodite in which gonad ablation caused P5.p-P7.p to fuse with hyp7 (see text). (C) lin-3(RNAi) reduced the competence of P5.p-P7.p when wnt activity is compromised. The gray bars represent lin-3(RNAi), and the black bars represent mCherry(RNAi) in a cwn-1;egl-20;arIs99 background. Each set represents a separate RNAi experiment. A t test was used to determine the P values and standard deviation of the P5.p, P6.p, and P7.p cells that adopt the F fate compared with the negative control. ***, P < 0.001; **, P < 0.01; and *, P < 0.05. n > 60 for all experiments.