Mutations in the Drosophila Orthologs of the F-Actin Capping Protein α- and β-Subunits Cause Actin Accumulation and Subsequent Retinal Degeneration

The progression of several human neurodegenerative diseases is characterized by the appearance of intracellular inclusions or cytoskeletal abnormalities. An important question is whether these abnormalities actually contribute to the degenerative process or whether they are merely manifestations of cells that are already destined for degeneration. We have conducted a large screen in Drosophila for mutations that alter the growth or differentiation of cells during eye development. We have used mitotic recombination to generate patches of homozygous mutant cells. In our entire screen, mutations in only two different loci, burned (bnd) and scorched (scrd), resulted in eyes in which the mutant patches appeared black and the mutant tissue appeared to have undergone degeneration. In larval imaginal discs, growth and cell fate specification occur normally in mutant cells, but there is an accumulation of F-actin. Mutant cells degenerate much later during the pupal phase of development. burned mutations are allelic to mutations in the previously described cpb locus that encodes the β-subunit of the F-actin capping protein, while scorched mutations disrupt the gene encoding its α-subunit (cpa). The α/β-heterodimer caps the barbed ends of an actin filament and restricts its growth. In its absence, cells progressively accumulate actin filaments and eventually die. A possible role for their human orthologs in neurodegenerative disease merits further investigation

Reciprocal regulatory interactions between the Notch and Ras signaling pathways in the Drosophila embryonic mesoderm

Convergent intercellular signals must be precisely integrated in order to elicit specific biological responses. During specification of muscle and cardiac progenitors from clusters of equivalent cells in the Drosophila embryonic mesoderm, the Ras/MAPK pathway—activated by both epidermal and fibroblast growth factor receptors—functions as an inductive cellular determination signal, while lateral inhibition mediated by Notch antagonizes this activity. A critical balance between these signals must be achieved to enable one cell of an equivalence group to segregate as a progenitor while its neighbors assume a nonprogenitor identity. We have investigated whether these opposing signals directly interact with each other, and we have examined how they are integrated by the responding cells to specify their unique fates. Our findings reveal that Ras and Notch do not function independently; rather, we have uncovered several modes of cross-talk between these pathways. Ras induces Notch, its ligand Delta, and the epidermal growth factor receptor antagonist, Argos. We show that Delta and Argos then synergize to nonautonomously block a positive autoregulatory feedback loop that amplifies a fate-inducing Ras signal. This feedback loop is characterized by Ras-mediated upregulation of proximal components of both the epidermal and fibroblast growth factor receptor pathways. In turn, Notch activation in nonprogenitors induces its own expression and simultaneously suppresses both Delta and Argos levels, thereby reinforcing a unidirectional inhibitory response. These reciprocal interactions combine to generate the signal thresholds that are essential for proper specification of progenitors and nonprogenitors from groups of initially equivalent cells.M.K.B. is supported by the Society of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and by National Institutes of Health Grant GM 56989. Support for A.C. is from an EMBO Postdoctoral Fellowship and a Human Frontiers Postdoctoral Fellowship. M.S.H. is an American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellow. A.M.M. is an Associate Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.Peer reviewe