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Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America logoLink to Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
. 1995 Oct 10;92(21):9465–9469. doi: 10.1073/pnas.92.21.9465

A recessive mutation, immune deficiency (imd), defines two distinct control pathways in the Drosophila host defense.

B Lemaitre 1, E Kromer-Metzger 1, L Michaut 1, E Nicolas 1, M Meister 1, P Georgel 1, J M Reichhart 1, J A Hoffmann 1
PMCID: PMC40822  PMID: 7568155

Abstract

In this paper we report a recessive mutation, immune deficiency (imd), that impairs the inducibility of all genes encoding antibacterial peptides during the immune response of Drosophila. When challenged with bacteria, flies carrying this mutation show a lower survival rate than wild-type flies. We also report that, in contrast to the antibacterial peptides, the antifungal peptide drosomycin remains inducible in a homozygous imd mutant background. These results point to the existence of two different pathways leading to the expression of two types of target genes, encoding either the antibacterial peptides or the antifungal peptide drosomycin.

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Selected References

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