Polarity and intracellular compartmentalization of Drosophila neurons

By M. Rolls, D. Satoh, P. Clyne, Astra L. Henner, Tadashi Uemura, C. Doe. 2007

164 citations recorded by the source corpus.

BackgroundProper neuronal function depends on forming three primary subcellular compartments: axons, dendrites, and soma. Each compartment has a specialized function (the axon to send information, dendrites to receive information, and the soma is where most cellular components are produced). In mammalian neurons, each primary compartment has distinctive molecular and morphological features, as well as smaller domains, such as the axon initial segment, that have more specialized functions. How neuronal subcellular compartments are established and maintained is not well understood. Genetic studies in Drosophila have provided insight into other areas of neurobiology, but it is not known whether flies are a good system in which to study neuronal polarity as a comprehensive analysis of Drosophila neuronal subcellular organization has not been performed.ResultsHere we use new and previously characterized markers to examine Drosophila neuronal compartments. We find that: axons and dendrites can accumulate different microtubule-binding proteins; protein synthesis machinery is concentrated in the cell body; pre- and post-synaptic sites localize to distinct regions of the neuron; and specializations similar to the initial segment are present. In addition, we track EB1-GFP dynamics and determine microtubules in axons and dendrites have opposite polarity.ConclusionWe conclude that Drosophila will be a powerful system to study the establishment and maintenance of neuronal compartments.

Subfields: Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience, Molecular Biology, Neuroscience

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Citations in the corpus

An Integrated Micro- and Macroarchitectural Analysis of the Drosophila Brain by Computer-Assisted Serial Section Electron Microscopy (2010, background): “We know of many proteins that are differentially expressed in specific membrane domains [59,60] and that the directional protein transport in axons and dendrites is controlled by different mechanisms.”
Tools for neuroanatomy and neurogenetics in Drosophila (2008, background): “Such studies can be aided by expression of markers directed to axons, dendrites, or synapses (15, 16).”
Genetic manipulation of genes and cells in the nervous system of the fruit fly (2011, methodology): “Binary Reporter Constructs for Visualization of Neurons Regulation Reporter Location Readout References GAL4 5x/10xUAS GFP Cytoplasmic Green Yeh et al., 1995; Pfeiffer et al., 2010 5xUAS 2xGFP Cytoplasmic Green Halfon et al., 2002 1x/3x/5x/10x/15x/20x/40xUAS CD8-GFP Membrane Green Lee and Luo, 1999;”