Abstract
BackgroundWnt6 is an evolutionarily ancient member of the Wnt family. In Drosophila, Wnt6 loss-of-function animals have not yet been reported, hence information about fly Wnt6 function is lacking. In wing discs, Wnt6 is expressed at the dorsal/ventral boundary in a pattern similar to that of wingless, an important regulator of wing size. To test whether Wnt6 also contributes towards wing size regulation, we generated Wnt6 knockout flies.ResultsWnt6 knockout flies are viable and have no obvious defect in wing size or planar cell polarity. Surprisingly, Wnt6 knockouts lack maxillary palps. Interestingly, Wnt6 is absent from the genome of hemipterans, correlating with the absence of maxillary palps in these insects.ConclusionsWnt6 is important for maxillary palp development in Drosophila, and phylogenetic analysis indicates that loss of Wnt6 may also have led to loss of maxillary palps on an evolutionary time scale.
Highlights
Wnt6 is an evolutionarily ancient member of the Wnt family
Wnt6 knockout flies lack maxillary palps To study the developmental function of Wnt6 in Drosophila, we generated Wnt6 knockout (Wnt6KO)
Wnt6KO animals, completely lack maxillary palps, structures used by flies for olfaction Figure 1D-D’ and Additional file 2: Figure S2) [13,15]
Summary
Wnt is an evolutionarily ancient member of the Wnt family. In Drosophila, Wnt loss-of-function animals have not yet been reported, information about fly Wnt function is lacking. Wnt is expressed at the dorsal/ventral boundary in a pattern similar to that of wingless, an important regulator of wing size. To test whether Wnt contributes towards wing size regulation, we generated Wnt knockout flies. Tissue growth is tightly controlled, leading to adults of defined sizes and proportions. Tissue growth is regulated by a combination of patterning cues, which give each tissue a specific identity and size, and environmental cues, which are sensed through nutrient responsive pathways and act to proportionately scale the whole animal [1,2,3,4]. Growth of the fly wing is promoted via signals emanating from the anterior/posterior (A/P) and dorsal/ventral (D/V) compartment boundaries, such as Dpp and wingless respectively [2]. We decided to test whether Wnt might constitute this second signal
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