Reference Report

Reference
Citation	Robinett, C.C., Vaughan, A.G., Knapp, J.M., Baker, B.S. (2010). Sex and the single cell. II. There is a time and place for sex. PLoS Biol. 8(5): e1000365. (Export to RIS)
FlyBase ID	FBrf0210735
Publication Type	Research paper
PubMed ID	20454565
PubMed Abstract	The Drosophila melanogaster sex hierarchy controls sexual differentiation of somatic cells via the activities of the terminal genes in the hierarchy, doublesex (dsx) and fruitless (fru). We have targeted an insertion of GAL4 into the dsx gene, allowing us to visualize dsx-expressing cells in both sexes. Developmentally and as adults, we find that both XX and XY individuals are fine mosaics of cells and tissues that express dsx and/or fruitless (fru(M)), and hence have the potential to sexually differentiate, and those that don't. Evolutionary considerations suggest such a mosaic expression of sexuality is likely to be a property of other animal species having two sexes. These results have also led to a major revision of our view of how sex-specific functions are regulated by the sex hierarchy in flies. Rather than there being a single regulatory event that governs the activities of all downstream sex determination regulatory genes-turning on Sex lethal (Sxl) RNA splicing activity in females while leaving it turned off in males-there are, in addition, elaborate temporal and spatial transcriptional controls on the expression of the terminal regulatory genes, dsx and fru. Thus tissue-specific aspects of sexual development are jointly specified by post-transcriptional control by Sxl and by the transcriptional controls of dsx and fru expression.
DOI	10.1371/journal.pbio.1000365
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Language of Publication	English
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Publication Type	Journal
Abbreviation	PLoS Biol.
Title	PLoS Biology
Publication Year	2003-
ISBN/ISSN	1545-7885 1544-9173
Data from Reference
Aberrations (1)
	In(3LR)dsx³⁴
Alleles (12)
	Avic\GFP^{Stinger.Scer\UAS.T:nls-tra} Disc\RFP^{DsRedT4.Scer\UAS.T:nls-tra} Disc\RFP^{tdTomato.Ecol\lexAop.T:nls-tra} dsx¹ dsx^{dsRNA.Scer\UAS.WIZ} dsx^GAL4 dsx^{WO2.GAL4.Scer\SceI.RS} Ecol\lacZ^{bab1-A128.1F3} Ecol\lacZ^neur-A101 Ecol\lexA^{fru.P1.T:Hsim\VP16} Mmus\Cd8a^{Scer\UAS.T:Avic\GFP} Scer\GAL4^dsx-GAL4
Constructs (6)
	P{FRT(WO2-dsx-GAL4)} P{lexAop(-FRT)tdTomato.nls} P{UAS-dsx.IR} P{UAS-mCD8::GFP.L} P{UAS-RedStinger} P{UAS-Stinger}
Genes (16)
	Avic\GFP bab1 CadN Disc\RFP dsx Ecol\lacZ Ecol\lexA elav en fru Mmus\Cd8a neur repo Scer\GAL4 Sxl vas
Insertions (4)
	P{lArB}bab1^A128.1F3 P{lArB}neur^A101 P{UAS-dsx.IR}4 P{UAS-dsx.IR}10
Natural transposons (1)
	P-element