Project Details
Projekt
Specification, migration, and morphogenesis of arthropod muscles
Applicant
Professor Dr. Manfred Frasch
Subject Area
Developmental Biology
Term
from 2010 to 2017
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 102336348
Our proposal aims lo identify and characterize new genes and pathways that play important roles in regulating the development of appendicular muscles in two arthropods, Tribolium and Drosophila, and possibly have related functions during muscle development in vertebrate species. Our strategy is lo combine the advantage of the efficient and rapid RNAi knock-down procedures in Tribolium with the power of genetics in Drosophila. For the initial identification of such genes, we will participate in a collaborative genome-wide Tribolium RNAi injection screen, and then select a small number of genes that have the most interesting RNAi phenotypes in the leg musculature and have orthologs in Drosophila for in-depth analysis. In aim 1, we will carry out a detailed analysis of the roles of these genes in embryonic leg muscle development in Tribolium and, in this context, also examine the normal development of these muscles. In addition to their specific RNAi phenotypes, we will define the expression patterns of these genes and the subcellular localization of their gene products, which will provide important clues lo the particular molecular pathways and developmental steps during which these proteins act. In aim 2, we will study the roles of the Drosophila orthologs of the same genes both during embryonic muscle development and leg muscle development. Their temporal and spatial expression will be defined and their regulation by candidate upstream regulators will be examined. In order to define their exact functions in muscle development we will generate mutants for the selected genes and employ inducible RNAi as well as ectopic expression experiments. Altogether, we expect that these studies will reveal novel processes and gene functions during the specification, directed migration, pathfinding, and other morphogenetic processes during muscle development.
DFG Programme
Research Units
