A Model of the Spatio-temporal Dynamics of Drosophila Eye Disc Development.
Patterning and growth are linked during early development and have to be tightly controlled to result in a functional tissue or organ. During the development of the Drosophila eye, this linkage is particularly clear: the growth of the eye primordium mainly results from proliferating cells ahead of the morphogenetic furrow (MF), a moving signaling wave that sweeps across the tissue from the posterior to the anterior side, that induces proliferating cells anterior to it to differentiate and become cell cycle quiescent in its wake. Therefore, final eye disc size depends on the proliferation rate of undifferentiated cells and on the speed with which the MF sweeps across the eye disc. We developed a spatio-temporal model of the growing eye disc based on the regulatory interactions controlled by the signals Decapentaplegic (Dpp), Hedgehog (Hh) and the transcription factor Homothorax (Hth) and explored how the signaling patterns affect the movement of the MF and impact on eye disc growth. We used published and new quantitative data to parameterize the model. In particular, two crucial parameter values, the degradation rate of Hth and the diffusion coefficient of Hh, were measured. The model is able to reproduce the linear movement of the MF and the termination of growth of the primordium. We further show that the model can explain several mutant phenotypes, but fails to reproduce the previously observed scaling of the Dpp gradient in the anterior compartment.
Department of Biosystems, Science and Engineering (D-BSSE), ETH Zurich, Basel, Switzerland.|Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics (SIB), Basel, Switzerland.
Patrick
P
Fried
CABD, CSIC and Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Campus UPO, Seville, Spain.
Máximo
M
Sánchez-Aragón
CABD, CSIC and Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Campus UPO, Seville, Spain.
Daniel
0000-0003-1366-9574
D
Aguilar-Hidalgo
Department of Biosystems, Science and Engineering (D-BSSE), ETH Zurich, Basel, Switzerland.
Birgitta
B
Lehtinen
CABD, CSIC and Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Campus UPO, Seville, Spain.
Fernando
F
Casares
Department of Biosystems, Science and Engineering (D-BSSE), ETH Zurich, Basel, Switzerland.|Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics (SIB), Basel, Switzerland.
Dagmar
D
Iber
D000818:Animals; D049109:Cell Proliferation; D019295:Computational Biology; D003198:Computer Simulation; D004330:Drosophila / Q000254:growth & development*; D029721:Drosophila Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D005123:Eye / Q000254:growth & development*; D009024:Morphogenesis / Q000502:physiology*; D015398:Signal Transduction / Q000502:physiology*; D062211:Spatio-Temporal Analysis
D029721:Drosophila Proteins