Gbb/Bmp signaling is essential for maintaining germline stem cells and for repressing bam transcription in the Drosophila testis
Gbb/Bmp signaling is essential for maintaining germline stem cells and for repressing bam transcription in the Drosophila testis
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DOI：
10.1242/dev.01025
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发表时间：
2004-03-01
期刊：
影响因子：
4.6
通讯作者：
Xie, T
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Kawase, E;Wong, MD;Xie, T
干细胞负责在一生中替换各种成体组织中受损或死亡的细胞。它们在未来的再生医学和基因治疗方面具有巨大的潜力。然而，对干细胞调控的机制知之甚少。果蝇睾丸中的生殖系干细胞（GSC）已被证明存在于小生境中，因此这些代表了研究小生境与干细胞之间关系的良好系统。在这里，我们表明，BMP信号从体细胞是必不可少的维持GSC在果蝇睾丸。体细胞囊肿细胞和枢纽细胞表达两种Bmp分子，Gbb和Dpp。我们的遗传分析表明，gbb功能与dpp合作，以维持男性GSC，虽然gbb单独是必不可少的GSC的维护。此外，突变克隆分析表明，BMP信号直接作用于GSC并控制其维持。在Bmp信号传导缺陷的GSC中，bam的表达上调，而GSC中强制的bam表达导致GSC丢失。这项研究表明，Bmp信号从体细胞维持GSC，至少部分，通过抑制bam表达在果蝇睾丸。已知dpp信号传导对于维持果蝇卵巢中的GSC至关重要。这项研究进一步表明果蝇雄性和雌性GSC都使用Bmp信号来维持GSC。
Stem cells are responsible for replacing damaged or dying cells in various adult tissues throughout a lifetime. They possess great potential for future regenerative medicine and gene therapy. However, the mechanisms governing stem cell regulation are poorly understood. Germline stem cells (GSCs) in the Drosophila testis have been shown to reside in niches, and thus these represent an excellent system for studying relationships between niches and stem cells. Here we show that Bmp signals from somatic cells are essential for maintaining GSCs in the Drosophila testis. Somatic cyst cells and hub cells express two Bmp molecules, Gbb and Dpp. Our genetic analysis indicates that gbb functions cooperatively with dpp to maintain male GSCs, although gbb alone is essential for GSC maintenance. Furthermore, mutant clonal analysis shows that Bmp signals directly act on GSCs and control their maintenance. In GSCs defective in Bmp signaling, expression of bam is upregulated, whereas forced bam expression in GSCs causes the GSCs to be lost. This study demonstrates that Bmp signals from the somatic cells maintain GSCs, at least in part, by repressing bam expression in the Drosophila testis. dpp signaling is known to be essential for maintaining GSCs in the Drosophila ovary. This study further suggests that both Drosophila male and female GSCs use Bmp signals to maintain GSCs.