The authors used live imaging and quantitative analysis to study the dynamics of the proneural factor Scute (Sc) during lateral inhibition in the developing Drosophila pupal abdomen. They found that:
Fate symmetry breaking, where cells adopt distinct fates, occurred at low levels of Sc expression, without a prolonged phase of mutual inhibition.
Cell-to-cell variations in Sc levels increased prior to fate symmetry breaking and positively correlated with the rate of fate divergence. Experimentally increasing Sc heterogeneity led to faster fate decisions.
Notch activity was minimal around the time of fate symmetry breaking, suggesting that Notch-mediated lateral inhibition acts rapidly at low proneural levels to generate the salt-and-pepper pattern of sensory organ precursor (SOP) cells.
In a small fraction of cases (~10%), pairs of neighboring cells adopted the SOP fate, but these defects were corrected through subsequent cell rearrangements.
Overall, the study provides insights into the spatial and temporal dynamics of lateral inhibition, showing that initial differences in proneural gene expression are amplified to generate stable cell fates, and that cell-to-cell heterogeneity plays a key role in promoting rapid fate divergence.
לשפה אחרת
מתוכן המקור
biorxiv.org
תובנות מפתח מזוקקות מ:
by phan,m.-s., ... ב- www.biorxiv.org 03-13-2024
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2024.03.11.583933v1שאלות מעמיקות