The Role of M1BP in Eye Development of Drosophila melanogaster

Many genes in the Drosophila melanogaster have Pol II paused at the promoter proximal region, because the binding of either the GAGA factor or the Motif 1 binding protein (M1BP). M1BP resides on chromosome 2 of Drosophila melanogaster and directs a distinct transcriptional mechanism evolved from the TATA box. M1BP is highly conserved across the species and encodes a 55kDa protein containing five C2H2 zinc-fingers domains. A battery of highly conserved genes regulates drosophila eye development. Based on high throughput studies, it has been suggested that M1BP may regulate gene expression during Drosophila eye development, but its exact role is unknown. Our aim is to study the role of M1BP during eye development. We have used Green Fluorescent Protein (GFP) marker to identify intended regions to be expressed. This GFP marker has expressed the dorsal, ventral, morphogenetic furrow and the entire eye. This aim is further focused with absence of M1BP being produced in the stock fly and then focusing on the phenotype and genotype when crossed with another set of flies that have a suppression in development of some aspect of the eye. We found that absence of M1BP function in dorsal and ventral eye margins results in the suppression of eye fate. This suppression of eye fate was found when both the dorsal and ventral margins were expressed, along with a suppression of eye fate when the dorsal and ventral regions were expressed separately. The absence of M1BP also led to the suppression of the gene from the complete eye, giving us a head loss phenotype. This head loss phenotype shows the destruction and absence of photoreceptors in the developmental stages of the eye.https://ecommons.udayton.edu/stander_posters/1858/thumbnail.jp