title: What can flies tell us about zinc homeostasis?
abstract: Zinc is an essential micronutrient for all organisms. For multicellular organisms, zinc uptake, storage, distribution and export are tightly regulated at both cellular and organismal levels, to cope with the multiple requirements versus the toxicity of the metal ion. During the past decade, the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster has become an important model organism for the elucidation of metazoan zinc homeostasis. This review describes our current knowledge of various zinc transporters in Drosophila, with an emphasis on the process of dietary zinc uptake in the fly. We also discuss how Drosophila was used as a model to facilitate our understanding of the role of zinc in neurodegenerative diseases.
authors.affiliation: College of Food Science and Engineering, Hefei University of Technology, Hefei, Anhui 230009, China; State Key Laboratory of Membrane Biology, School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China.
authors.forename: Guiran
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Membrane Biology, School of Life Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China. Electronic address: zhoubing@mail.tsinghua.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Bing
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Zhou
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002352:Carrier Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D027682:Cation Transport Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D004032:Diet; D029721:Drosophila Proteins / Q000378:metabolism*; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006706:Homeostasis; D006801:Humans; D007413:Intestinal Mucosa / Q000378:metabolism; D008297:Male; D008565:Membrane Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D009154:Mutation; D018995:Myosin Heavy Chains / Q000378:metabolism; D019636:Neurodegenerative Diseases / Q000378:metabolism; D015032:Zinc / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D002352:Carrier Proteins; D027682:Cation Transport Proteins; D029721:Drosophila Proteins; D008565:Membrane Proteins; C097862:Zip protein, Drosophila; C017800:zinc-binding protein; D018995:Myosin Heavy Chains; D015032:Zinc
keywords: Drosophila; Gut; Homeostasis; Neurodegeneration; Zinc