Steroids Make You Bigger? Fat Chance Says Myc

In flies, ecdysone integrates growth with developmental transitions by antagonizing insulin signaling, which links growth with nutritional status. Work in Developmental Cell (Delanoue et. al, 2010) finds that ecdysone represses the transcription factor Myc in the larval fat body to inhibit systemic growth, revealing a mechanism for such coordination

Of flies and men: insights on organismal metabolism from fruit flies

The fruit fly Drosophila has contributed significantly to our general understanding of the basic principles of signaling, cell and developmental biology, and neurobiology. However, answers to questions pertaining to energy metabolism have been so far mostly addressed in more complex model organisms such as mice. We review in this article recent studies that show how the genetic tractability and simplicity of Drosophila are being used to identify novel regulatory mechanisms at the organismal level, and to query the co-ordination between energy metabolism and other processes such as neurodegeneration, circadian rhythms, immunity, and tumor biology

All for one, and one for all: the clonality of the intestinal stem cell niche

Intestinal epithelia are maintained by intestinal stem cells (ISCs) that divide to replace dying absorptive and secretory cells that make up this tissue. Lineage labeling studies, both in vertebrates and Drosophila, have revealed the relationships between ISCs and their progeny. In addition, a number of signaling pathways involved in ISC proliferation and differentiation have been identified. Further studies will clarify the signals originating from the ISC niche and determine the processes that control the number and uniform distribution of niches throughout the epithelium

Homeostasis in Infected Epithelia: Stem Cells Take the Lead

To maintain tissue homeostasis and avoid disease, epithelial cells damaged by pathogens need to be readily replenished, and this is mainly achieved by the activation of stem cells. In this Short Review, we discuss recent developments in the exciting field of host epithelia-pathogen interaction in Drosophila as well as in mammals

Role of Autophagy in Glycogen Breakdown and Its Relevance to Chloroquine Myopathy

Several myopathies are associated with defects in autophagic and lysosomal degradation of glycogen, but it remains unclear how glycogen is targeted to the lysosome and what significance this process has for muscle cells. We have established a Drosophila melanogaster model to study glycogen autophagy in skeletal muscles, using chloroquine (CQ) to simulate a vacuolar myopathy that is completely dependent on the core autophagy genes. We show that autophagy is required for the most efficient degradation of glycogen in response to starvation. Furthermore, we show that CQ-induced myopathy can be improved by reduction of either autophagy or glycogen synthesis, the latter possibly due to a direct role of Glycogen Synthase in regulating autophagy through its interaction with Atg8

The Hippo tumor suppressor pathway regulates intestinal stem cell regeneration

Skip to Next Section Identification of the signaling pathways that control the proliferation of stem cells (SCs), and whether they act in a cell or non-cell autonomous manner, is key to our understanding of tissue homeostasis and cancer. In the adult Drosophila midgut, the Jun N-Terminal Kinase (JNK) pathway is activated in damaged enterocyte cells (ECs) following injury. This leads to the production of Upd cytokines from ECs, which in turn activate the Janus kinase (JAK)/Signal transducer and activator of transcription (STAT) pathway in Intestinal SCs (ISCs), stimulating their proliferation. In addition, the Hippo pathway has been recently implicated in the regulation of Upd production from the ECs. Here, we show that the Hippo pathway target, Yorkie (Yki), also plays a crucial and cell-autonomous role in ISCs. Activation of Yki in ISCs is sufficient to increase ISC proliferation, a process involving Yki target genes that promote division, survival and the Upd cytokines. We further show that prior to injury, Yki activity is constitutively repressed by the upstream Hippo pathway members Fat and Dachsous (Ds). These findings demonstrate a cell-autonomous role for the Hippo pathway in SCs, and have implications for understanding the role of this pathway in tumorigenesis and cancer stem cells

SALS, a WH2-Domain-Containing Protein, Promotes Sarcomeric Actin Filament Elongation from Pointed Ends during Drosophila Muscle Growth

SummaryOrganization of actin filaments into a well-organized sarcomere structure is critical for muscle development and function. However, it is not completely understood how sarcomeric actin/thin filaments attain their stereotyped lengths. In an RNAi screen in Drosophila primary muscle cells, we identified a gene, sarcomere length short (sals), which encodes an actin-binding, WH2 domain-containing protein, required for proper sarcomere size. When sals is knocked down by RNAi, primary muscles display thin myofibrils with shortened sarcomeres and increased sarcomere number. Both loss- and gain-of-function analyses indicate that SALS may influence sarcomere lengths by promoting thin-filament lengthening from pointed ends. Furthermore, the complex localization of SALS and other sarcomeric proteins in myofibrils reveals that the full length of thin filaments is achieved in a two-step process, and that SALS is required for the second elongation phase, most likely because it antagonizes the pointed-end capping protein Tropomodulin