Marriage shrines and worms impacting our understanding of mammalian fertilization.
Genetic approaches inC. elegansare complementing the biochemical and antibody based strategies traditionally used to study the molecular underpinnings of fertilization in other organisms. A pair of worm studies, one based on forward genetics and one based on reverse genetics, converge on the sperm immunoglobulin superfamily molecule SPE-45. Loss ofspe-45function leads to the production of sperm that cannot fertilize wild-type eggs. This is a strikingly similar phenotype as those seen in mice lacking the immunoglobulin superfamily protein Izumo1. This work sets the stage for leveraging the power of theC. elegansmodel system to learn more about Izumo-like molecular function but also for the discovery of additional deeply conserved components of fertility pathways.
Waksman Institute of Microbiology, Rutgers University , Piscataway, NJ, USA.
Amber R
AR
Krauchunas
Waksman Institute of Microbiology, Rutgers University , Piscataway, NJ, USA.
Andrew
A
Singson
Izumo; SPE-45; egg; fertilization; immunoglobulin; sperm
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