A brief history of Drosophila's contributions to genome research.
The sequence of the Drosophila melanogaster genome presented in this issue of Science is the latest milestone in nine decades of research on this organism. Genetic and physical mapping, whole-genome mutational screens, and functional alteration of the genome by gene transfer were pioneered in metazoans with the use of this small fruit fly. Here we look at some of the instances in which work on Drosophila has led to major conceptual or technical breakthroughs in our understanding of animal genomes.
Rubin
G M
GM
Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-3200, USA.
Lewis
E B
EB
D000818:Animals; D030801:Animals, Genetically Modified; D002874:Chromosome Mapping / Q000266:history; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D019295:Computational Biology / Q000266:history; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000235:genetics*; D017344:Genes, Insect; D005823:Genetics / Q000266:history*; D016678:Genome; D049673:History, 20th Century; D009154:Mutation; D009613:Nobel Prize; D020161:Physical Chromosome Mapping / Q000266:history; D011995:Recombination, Genetic; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA