
The Drosophila polypyrimidine tract-binding protein (dmPTB or hephaestus) plays an important role during spermatogenesis. The heph2 mutation in this gene results in a specific defect in spermatogenesis, causing aberrant spermatid individualization and male sterility. However, the array of molecular defects in the mutant remains uncharacterized. Using an unbiased high throughput sequencing approach, we have identified transcripts that are misregulated in this mutant. Aberrant transcripts show altered expression levels, exon skipping, and alternative 5' ends. We independently verified these findings by reverse-transcription and polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) analysis. Our analysis shows misregulation of transcripts that have been connected to spermatogenesis, including components of the actomyosin cytoskeletal apparatus. We show, for example, that the Myosin light chain 1 (Mlc1) transcript is aberrantly spliced. Furthermore, bioinformatics analysis reveals that Mlc1 contains a high affinity binding site(s) for dmPTB and that the site is conserved in many Drosophila species. We discuss that Mlc1 and other components of the actomyosin cytoskeletal apparatus offer important molecular links between the loss of dmPTB function and the observed developmental defect in spermatogenesis. This study provides the first comprehensive list of genes misregulated in vivo in the heph2 mutant in Drosophila and offers insight into the role of dmPTB during spermatogenesis.
Male, polypyrimidine tract-binding protein, Drosophila Proteins, Protein Isoforms, Cytoskeleton, Conserved Sequence, Phylogeny, Ontology, actomyosin, Q, R, High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing, Spermatids, Polymerase chain reaction, Insects, Drosophila melanogaster, Medicine, Drosophila, Hephaestus, Transcription Initiation Site, Exon skipping, Research Article, Polypyrimidine Tract-Binding Protein, 572, Bioinformatics, Science, Molecular Sequence Data, Myosin, Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction, Rodents, Male sterility, Datasets, Light chains, Animals, RNA, Messenger, Genomes, Spermatogenesis, Binomial distribution, Binding Sites, Base Sequence, Gene Expression Profiling, Proteins, Genetics and Genomics, Gene Ontology, Gene Expression Regulation, Mutation, Gene expression
Male, polypyrimidine tract-binding protein, Drosophila Proteins, Protein Isoforms, Cytoskeleton, Conserved Sequence, Phylogeny, Ontology, actomyosin, Q, R, High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing, Spermatids, Polymerase chain reaction, Insects, Drosophila melanogaster, Medicine, Drosophila, Hephaestus, Transcription Initiation Site, Exon skipping, Research Article, Polypyrimidine Tract-Binding Protein, 572, Bioinformatics, Science, Molecular Sequence Data, Myosin, Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction, Rodents, Male sterility, Datasets, Light chains, Animals, RNA, Messenger, Genomes, Spermatogenesis, Binomial distribution, Binding Sites, Base Sequence, Gene Expression Profiling, Proteins, Genetics and Genomics, Gene Ontology, Gene Expression Regulation, Mutation, Gene expression
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