title: Shape of my heart: Cell-cell adhesion and cytoskeletal dynamics during Drosophila cardiac morphogenesis.
abstract: The fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster has recently emerged as an excellent system to investigate the genetics of cardiovascular development and disease. Drosophila provides an inexpensive and genetically-tractable in vivo system with a large number of conserved features. In addition, the Drosophila embryo is transparent, and thus amenable to time-lapse fluorescence microscopy, as well as biophysical and pharmacological manipulations. One of the conserved aspects of heart development from Drosophila to humans is the initial assembly of a tube. Here, we review the cellular behaviours and molecular dynamics important for the initial steps of heart morphogenesis in Drosophila, with particular emphasis on the cell-cell adhesion and cytoskeletal networks that cardiac precursors use to move, coordinate their migration, interact with other tissues and eventually sculpt a beating heart.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 3G9, Canada; Ted Rogers Centre for Heart Research, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5G 1M1, Canada.
authors.forename: Christopher M J
authors.initials: CMJ
authors.lastname: McFaul
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 3G9, Canada; Ted Rogers Centre for Heart Research, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5G 1M1, Canada; Department of Cell and Systems Biology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 3G5, Canada; Developmental and Stem Cell Biology Program, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, ON M5G 1X8, Canada. Electronic address: rodrigo.fernandez.gonzalez@utoronto.ca.
authors.forename: Rodrigo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Fernandez-Gonzalez
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D002448:Cell Adhesion / Q000502:physiology*; D003599:Cytoskeleton / Q000378:metabolism*; D029721:Drosophila Proteins / Q000378:metabolism; D006321:Heart / Q000254:growth & development*; D006801:Humans; D009024:Morphogenesis / Q000502:physiology*; D038081:Organogenesis / Q000502:physiology*
chemical_list: D029721:Drosophila Proteins
keywords: Actomyosin contractility; Adherens junctions; Collective cell migration