The Caenorhabditis elegans gene lin-1 encodes an ETS-domain protein and defines a branch of the vulval induction pathway.
The Caenorhabditis elegans gene lin-1 appears to act after the Ras-Raf-MEK-MAPK signaling cascade that mediates vulval induction. We show that lin-1 is a negative regulator of vulval cell fates and encodes an ETS-domain putative transcription factor containing potential MAPK phosphorylation sites. In lin-1 null mutants, the vulval precursor cells (VPCs) still respond to signaling from the gonadal anchor cell, indicating that lin-1 defines a branch of the inductive signaling pathway. We also provide evidence that the inductive and lateral signaling pathways are integrated to control the 1 degree and 2 degrees vulval cell fates after the point at which lin-1 acts in the inductive pathway and that VPCs can assess the relative rather than absolute levels of inductive and lateral signaling in determining whether to express the 1 degree or 2 degrees vulval cell fates.
Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge 02139, USA.
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GJ
Beitel
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Tuck
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Greenwald
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Horvitz
D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D017173:Caenorhabditis elegans / Q000196:embryology* / Q000235:genetics; D029742:Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D018076:DNA, Complementary; D005260:Female; D018507:Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D017354:Point Mutation; D011518:Proto-Oncogene Proteins / Q000235:genetics*; D050783:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-ets; D017386:Sequence Homology, Amino Acid; D014157:Transcription Factors / Q000235:genetics*; D014844:Vulva / Q000196:embryology*
D029742:Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins; D018076:DNA, Complementary; C097533:Lin-1 protein, C elegans; D011518:Proto-Oncogene Proteins; D050783:Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-ets; D014157:Transcription Factors