Reference Report

Reference
Citation	Lo, P.C., Skeath, J.B., Gajewski, K., Schulz, R.A., Frasch, M. (2002). Homeotic genes autonomously specify the anteroposterior subdivision of the Drosophila dorsal vessel into aorta and heart. Dev. Biol. 251(2): 307--319. (Export to RIS)
FlyBase ID	FBrf0151890
Publication Type	Research paper
PubMed ID	12435360
PubMed Abstract	The embryonic dorsal vessel in Drosophila possesses anteroposterior polarity and is subdivided into two chamber-like portions, the aorta in the anterior and the heart in the posterior. The heart portion features a wider bore as compared with the aorta and develops inflow valves (ostia) that allow the pumping of hemolymph from posterior toward the anterior. Here, we demonstrate that homeotic selector genes provide positional information that determines the anteroposterior subdivision of the dorsal vessel. Antennapedia (Antp), Ultrabithorax (Ubx), abdominal-A (abd-A), and Abdominal-B (Abd-B) are expressed in distinct domains along the anteroposterior axis within the dorsal vessel, and, in particular, the domain of abd-A expression in cardioblasts and pericardial cells coincides with the heart portion. We provide evidence that loss of abd-A function causes a transformation of the heart into aorta, whereas ectopic expression of abd-A in more anterior cardioblasts causes the aorta to assume heart-like features. These observations suggest that the spatially restricted expression and activity of abd-A determine heart identities in cells of the posterior portion of the dorsal vessel. We also show that Abd-B, which at earlier stages is expressed posteriorly to the cardiogenic mesoderm, represses cardiogenesis. In light of the developmental and morphological similarities between the Drosophila dorsal vessel and the primitive heart tube in early vertebrate embryos, these data suggest that Hox genes may also provide important anteroposterior cues during chamber specification in the developing vertebrate heart.
DOI
Related Publication(s)
Recent Updates
Description	What does this section display? This section contains items that were added to this record for each release. It currently only tracks new links between this FlyBase report and other FlyBase data classes (e.g. genes, references, stocks) or controlled vocabulary terms (e.g. GO, anatomy terms). What does this section not display? This section does not currently display links that were removed or gene model changes.
Update Feed	Click the icon below to subscribe to this FlyBase record and receive updates automatically through your feed reader.
FB2013_03
FB2013_02
All updates	Click here to see a list of all updates to this record from FB2010_08 and on.
Associated Information
Comments
Associated Files
Other Information
Secondary IDs
Language of Publication	English
Additional Languages of Abstract
Also Published As
Parent Publication
Publication Type	Journal
Abbreviation	Dev. Biol.
Title	Developmental Biology
Publication Year	1959-
ISBN/ISSN	0012-1606
Data from Reference
Alleles (18)
	abd-A^MX1 abd-A^Scer\UAS.cGa Abd-B^D18 Abd-B^Scer\UAS.cCa Avic\GFP^{S65T.Scer\UAS} Ecol\lacZ^svp-AE127 Ecol\lacZ^tin.CΔ5 Ecol\lacZ^wg-en11 Scer\GAL4^how-24B Scer\GAL4^Kr.PM Scer\GAL4^{Mef2.hs.4cc-B3} Scer\GAL4^tin.CΔ4 Scer\GAL4^twi.2PE Scer\GAL4^twi.PB Scer\GAL4^twi.PG svp^I.Scer\UAS wg^DE wg^l-12
Constructs (11)
	P{GAL4-Kr.C} P{GAL4-twi.2xPE} P{GAL4-twi.B} P{GAL4-twi.G} P{Mef2-GAL4.4cc-B3} P{tinC-Gal4.Δ4} P{tinC-lacZ.Δ5} P{UAS-abd-A.G} P{UAS-Abd-B.m.C} P{UAS-GFP.S65T} P{UAS-svp.I}
Genes (16)
	abd-A Abd-B Antp Avic\GFP Dfd Ecol\lacZ eve lab Mef2 prc Scer\GAL4 Scr svp tin Ubx wg
Insertions (3)
	P{en1}wg^en11 P{GawB}how^24B P{lwB}svp^AE127