Abstract
The expression patterns of myosin-IA (MIA) and myosin-IB (MIB), two novel unconventional myosins from Drosophila melanogaster, have been characterized through immunoblot analysis and immunocytochemistry of embryos, larvae, and adults. The appearance and distribution of both proteins during embryogenesis is correlated with the formation of a brush border within the alimentary canal as documented at the ultrastructural level. MIA and MIB, both found predominantly at the basolateral domain of immature enterocytes, exhibit increased expression at the apical domain of differentiated enterocytes co-incident with microvillus assembly. Colocalization of MIA and MIB to larval and adult gut by confocal microscopy demonstrates distinct but overlapping subcellular distributions of these two proteins. In the larval brush border, MIA is enriched in the subapical terminal web domain whereas MIB is found predominantly in the apical microvillar domain. In the adult gut, MIA and MIB both exhibit a microvillar component as MIA attains a more apical position in addition to its previous terminal web locale. MIB is also found in egg chambers at both the basolateral and apical surfaces of the somatic follicle cells during oogenesis. MIA and MIB both demonstrate ATP-dependent extraction from the larval brush border cytoskeleton and exogenous F-actin, biochemical properties characteristic of functional myosins-I.
