A regulatory network of T-box genes and theeven-skippedhomologuevab-7controls patterning and morphogenesis inC. elegans
10.1242/dev.01110
Crossref journal-article
The Company of Biologists
Development (237)
Abstract

T-box genes form a large family of conserved transcription factors with diverse roles in animal development, but so far functions for only a few have been studied in detail. Here we show that four Caenorhabditis elegansT-box genes and the even-skipped-like homeobox gene vab-7function within a regulatory network to control embryonic patterning and morphogenesis. tbx-8 and tbx-9 have functionally redundant roles in the intercalation of posterior dorsal hypodermal cells, in muscle cell positioning and in intestinal development. Inhibiting tbx-9alone using RNA interference (RNAi) produces worms that have a thickened,`bobbed tail' phenotype, similar to that seen in mutants of vab-7,which itself has been shown to pattern posterior muscle and hypodermal cells. In support of the view that these genes function in the same pathway, we find that tbx-8 and tbx-9 are both necessary and sufficient for vab-7 expression. In addition, a third T-box gene, tbx-30,acts to repress vab-7 expression in the anterior of embryos. We further show that vab-7 itself represses the T-box gene mab-9 in posterior cells. Thus, during posterior patterning in C. elegans, there are multiple interactions between T-box genes and the vab-7 homeobox gene. Evolutionary parallels in other organisms suggest that regulatory interactions between T-box genes and even-skipped homologues are conserved.

Bibliography

Pocock, R., Ahringer, J., Mitsch, M., Maxwell, S., & Woollard, A. (2004). A regulatory network of T-box genes and theeven-skippedhomologuevab-7controls patterning and morphogenesis inC. elegans. Development, 131(10), 2373–2385.

Authors 5
  1. Roger Pocock (first)
  2. Julie Ahringer (additional)
  3. Michael Mitsch (additional)
  4. Sara Maxwell (additional)
  5. Alison Woollard (additional)
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Dates
Type When
Created 21 years, 4 months ago (April 26, 2004, 8:23 p.m.)
Deposited 2 years, 4 months ago (April 28, 2023, 9:14 a.m.)
Indexed 1 month ago (Aug. 2, 2025, 12:11 a.m.)
Issued 21 years, 3 months ago (May 15, 2004)
Published 21 years, 3 months ago (May 15, 2004)
Published Print 21 years, 3 months ago (May 15, 2004)
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@article{Pocock_2004, title={A regulatory network of T-box genes and theeven-skippedhomologuevab-7controls patterning and morphogenesis inC. elegans}, volume={131}, ISSN={0950-1991}, url={http://dx.doi.org/10.1242/dev.01110}, DOI={10.1242/dev.01110}, number={10}, journal={Development}, publisher={The Company of Biologists}, author={Pocock, Roger and Ahringer, Julie and Mitsch, Michael and Maxwell, Sara and Woollard, Alison}, year={2004}, month=may, pages={2373–2385} }