Bedraggled, a putative transporter, influences the tissue polarity complex during the R3/R4 fate decision in the Drosophila eye.

The tissue polarity pathway is required for the establishment of epithelial polarity in a variety of vertebrate and invertebrate organs. Core tissue polarity proteins act in a dynamically regulated complex to direct the polarization of the Drosophila eye. We report the identification and characterization of bedraggled (bdg), a novel gene that regulates one output of the tissue polarity pathway--the establishment of the R3/R4 photoreceptor fates.

Lentiviral-mediated RNAi inhibition of Sbds in murine hematopoietic progenitors impairs their hematopoietic potential.

Shwachman-Diamond syndrome (SDS) is a rare multisystem disorder characterized by exocrine pancreatic insufficiency, multilineage hematopoietic dysfunction, and metaphyseal chondrodysplasia. Bone marrow dysfunction is present in nearly all patients with SDS, with neutropenia being the most common abnormality. The majority of patients with SDS have mutations in the Shwachman Bodian Diamond syndrome (SBDS) gene.

Screen for genetic modifiers of stbm reveals that photoreceptor fate and rotation can be genetically uncoupled in the Drosophila eye.

Background: Polarity of the Drosophila compound eye arises primarily as a consequence of two events that are tightly linked in time and space: fate specification of two photoreceptor cells, R3 and R4, and the subsequent directional movement of the unit eyes of the compound eye, or ommatidia. While it is thought that these fates dictate the direction of ommatidial rotation, the phenotype of mutants in the genes that set up this polarity led to the hypothesis that these two events could be uncoupled.

Methodology/principal Findings: To definitively demonstrate these events are genetically separable, we conducted a dominant modifier screen to determine if genes, when misexpressed, could selectively enhance subclasses of mutant ommatidia in which the direction of rotation does not follow the R3/R4 cell fates, yet not affect the number of ommatidia in which rotation follows the R3/R4 cell fates.

Mutations of the SBDS gene are present in most patients with Shwachman-Diamond syndrome.

Shwachman-Diamond Syndrome (SDS) is a rare multisystem disorder characterized by exocrine pancreatic insufficiency, bone marrow dysfunction, and metaphyseal chondrodysplasia. Recent studies show that mutations of SBDS, a gene of unknown function, are present in the majority of patients with SDS. In the present study, we show that most, but not all, patients classified based on rigorous clinical criteria as having SDS had compound heterozygous mutations of SBDS.

Strabismus requires Flamingo and Prickle function to regulate tissue polarity in the Drosophila eye.

Tissue polarity in Drosophila is regulated by a number of genes that are thought to function in a complex, many of which interact genetically and/or physically, co-localize, and require other tissue polarity proteins for their localization. We report the enhancement of the strabismus tissue polarity phenotype by mutations in two other tissue polarity genes, flamingo and prickle. Flamingo is autonomously required for the establishment of ommatidial polarity.

The cadherins fat and dachsous regulate dorsal/ventral signaling in the Drosophila eye.

The Drosophila eye is a polarized epithelium in which ommatidia of opposing chirality fall on opposite sides of the eye's midline, the equator. The equator is established in at least two steps: photoreceptors R3 and R4 adopt their fates, and then ommatidia rotate clockwise or counterclockwise in accordance with the identity of these photoreceptors. We report the role of two cadherins, Fat (Ft) and Dachsous (Ds), in conveying the polarizing signal from the D/V midline in the Drosophila eye.