... cuticle formation has been limited by the lack of a method to detect it in living organisms. To overcome this limitation, we have developed ChtVis-Tomato, an in vivo reporter for chitin in Drosophila . ChtVis-Tomato encodes a fusion protein that contains an apical secretion signal, a chitin-binding domain...

... in this process, by regulating both endosperm breakdown and the formation of the embryonic cuticle. To what extent these processes are functionally linked is, however, unclear. In order to address this issue we have concentrated on the subtilisin-like serine protease encoding gene ABNORMAL LEAF-SHAPE1...

... to promote growth. We have identified an essential role for the bristle cuticle in the maintenance of bristle structure and shape at late stages of bristle development. We show that the small GTPase Rab11 mediates the organized deposition of chitin, a major cuticle component in bristles, and disrupting Rab11...

... or adaptation are subject to the same Creative Commons License terms. Joint morphology Notch signaling Cuticle Evolution Insect leg Drosophila The motility of a joint depends largely on its morphology. The joints within individual animals display diverse morphologies (ball...

...Falko Riedel; Daniela Vorkel; Suzanne Eaton The cuticular exoskeleton of arthropods is a composite material comprising well-separated layers that differ in function and molecular constituents. Epidermal cells secrete these layers sequentially, synthesizing components of distal cuticle layers before...

... ( [email protected] ) Competing interests statement The authors declare no competing financial interests. 21 4 2010 © 2010. 2010 Joint Ball-and-socket Cuticle Chitin Epidermis Cell shape change Leg Drosophila Regulation of the body shape has been a central...

... their subcellular targeting and extracellular assembly into functional matrices. The exoskeleton of Drosophila , the cuticle, is a stratified aECM containing ordered chitin polysaccharide lamellae and proteinaceous layers, and is suited for studies of molecular functions needed for aECM assembly. Here, we show...

..., we show that knickkopf ( knk ) and retroactive ( rtv ) are two new tube expansion mutants that fail to form filamentous chitin structures, both in the tracheal and cuticular chitin matrices. Mutations in knk and rtv are known to disrupt the embryonic cuticle, and our combined genetic analysis...

... ecdysis. At each molt the cuticle fails to open sufficiently at the anterior end and the partially shed cuticle is dragged behind the animal. The gene is expressed in hypodermal cells 4 hours before ecdysis during all larval stages. The NAS-37 protein accumulates in the anterior cuticle and is shed...

... and smooth cuticle: spitz group genes, which encode factors that stimulate EGFR signalling, induce the denticle fate, while Wingless signalling antagonizes the effect of EGFR signalling, allowing cells to adopt the smooth-cuticle fate. Medial fusion of denticle belts is also a hallmark of spitz group genes...

...Hirokazu Tanaka; Hitoshi Onouchi; Maki Kondo; Ikuko Hara-Nishimura; Mikio Nishimura; Chiyoko Machida; Yasunori Machida The surfaces of land plants are covered with a cuticle that is essential for retention of water. Epidermal surfaces of Arabidopsis thaliana embryos and juvenile plants that were...

... by heterochronic mutations that cause larval animals to express adult cuticles or adult animals to express larval cuticles, indicating that marker expression can be uncoupled from general cuticle development. Mutant lin-22 males, which have an anterior-to-posterior transformation of cell fates in the lateral...