Figure 3.—

Failure of bicoid mRNA polyadenylation in embryos from wisp mothers. Total RNA was extracted from ovarian oocytes or different stages of embryos from females of the indicated genotypes. PAT assays were performed to analyze the length of the bcd poly(A) tail. Tail lengths were estimated on the basis of molecular size markers. bcd poly(A) tail length increased in control embryos after egg activation (left). Polyadenylation of bcd mRNA does not occur in wisp mutant embryos (right). Rather, there is an ∼40-nt decrease in the length of the bcd poly(A) tail. PAT assays were performed on two independent sets of wisp⁴¹ and control samples, and one set of wisp²⁴⁸ and control samples.