Planar polarity and actin dynamics in the epidermis of Drosophila.

Dorsal closure is a morphogenetic process involving the coordinated convergence of two epithelial sheets to enclose the Drosophila melanogaster embryo. Specialized populations of cells at the edges of each epithelial sheet, the dorsal-most epidermal cells, emit actin-based processes that are essential for the proper enclosure of the embryo. Here we ...
show that actin dynamics at the leading edge is preceded by a planar polarization of the dorsal-most epidermal cells associated with a reorganization of the cytoskeleton. An important consequence of this planar polarization is the formation of actin-nucleating centres at the leading edge, which are important in the dynamics of actin. We show that Wingless (Wg) signalling and Jun amino-terminal kinase (JNK) signalling have overlapping but different roles in these events.
Mesh Terms:
Actins, Animals, Cell Polarity, Drosophila Proteins, Drosophila melanogaster, Embryo, Nonmammalian, Epidermis, JNK Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinases, MAP Kinase Kinase 4, Mitogen-Activated Protein Kinase Kinases, Morphogenesis, Mutation, Proto-Oncogene Proteins, Signal Transduction, Wnt1 Protein
Nat. Cell Biol.
Date: Dec. 01, 2002
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