The Homeotic Gene lin-39 and the Evolution of Nematode Epidermal Cell Fates

• Published in: Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) Vol. 278; no. 5337; pp. 452 - 455
• Main Authors: Eizinger, Andreas, Sommer, Ralf J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Society for the Advancement of Science 17.10.1997; American Association for the Advancement of Science; The American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Subjects: Alleles; Amino Acid Sequence; Animals; Apoptosis; Base Sequence; Biological and medical sciences; Biological Evolution; Caenorhabditis elegans; Caenorhabditis elegans - cytology; Caenorhabditis elegans - genetics; Caenorhabditis elegans - growth & development; Cell death; Cell Fusion; Cell Lineage; Cellular biology; Classical genetics, quantitative genetics, hybrids; Coding; Epidermal Cells; Epidermal growth factor; Epidermal growth factors; Evolution; Exons; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Genes; Genes, Helminth; Genes, Homeobox; Genetic mutation; Genetics of eukaryotes. Biological and molecular evolution; Invertebrata; Molecular biology; Molecular Sequence Data; Mutation; Phenotype; Phenotypes; Pristionchus pacificus; Rhabditida - cytology; Rhabditida - genetics; Stem Cells - cytology; Vulva; Vulva - cytology; Worms; Nucleotide sequence; Biological evolution; Epidermis; Homology; Cell lineage; Vulva; Cell differentiation; Caenorhabditis elegans; Homeotic gene; Helmintha; Development; Nemathelminthia; Mutation; Invertebrata; Nematoda
• ISSN: 0036-8075; 1095-9203
• DOI: 10.1126/science.278.5337.452

The fate of ventral epidermal cells differs among nematode species. Nonvulval cells fuse with the epidermis in Caenorhabditis elegans, whereas the homologous cells undergo apoptosis in Pristionchus pacificus. The homeotic gene lin-39 is involved in the regulation of these epidermal cell fates. In Caenorhabditis, lin-39 prevents cell fusion of potential vulval cells and specifies the vulva equivalence group. Pristionchus vulvaless mutants that displayed apoptosis of the vulval precursor cells were isolated, and point mutations in lin-39 were identified. Thus, the evolution of these epidermal cell fates is driven by different intrinsic properties of homologous cells.