Maintaining sufficient nanos is a critical function for polar granule component in the specification of primordial germ cells

Girish Deshpande, Emma Spady, Joe Goodhouse, Paul Schedl

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

6 Scopus citations

Abstract

Primordial germ cells (PGC) are the precursors of germline stem cells. In Drosophila, PGC specification is thought to require transcriptional quiescence and three genes, polar granule component (pgc), nanos (nos), and germ cell less (gcl) function to downregulate Pol II transcription. While it is not understood how nos or gcl represses transcription, pgc does so by inhibiting the transcription elongation factor b (P-TEFb), which is responsible for phosphorylating Ser2 residues in the heptad repeat of the Cterminal domain (CTD) of the largest Pol II subunit. In the studies reported here, we demonstrate that nos are a critical regulatory target of pgc. We show that a substantial fraction of the PGCs in pgc embryos have greatly reduced levels of Nos protein and exhibit phenotypes characteristic of nos PGCs. Lastly, restoring germ cell-specific expression of Nos is sufficient to ameliorate the pgc phenotype.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)1397-1403
Number of pages7
JournalG3: Genes, Genomes, Genetics
Volume2
Issue number11
DOIs
StatePublished - Nov 2012

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Genetics(clinical)
  • Genetics
  • Molecular Biology

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