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Molecular and Cellular Biology, June 1999, p. 4405-4413, Vol. 19, No. 6
ERATO Yamamoto Behavior Genes
Project3 and Developmental Genetics
Group,
Received 29 October 1998/Returned for modification 4 December
1998/Accepted 23 February 1999
We isolated a Drosophila fickleP
(ficP) mutant with a shortened copulatory duration
and reduced adult-stage life span. The reduced copulatory duration is
ascribable to incomplete fusion of the left and right halves of the
apodeme that holds the penis during copulation.
ficP is an intronic mutation occurring in the
Btk gene, a gene which encodes two forms (type 1 and type
2) of a Bruton's tyrosine kinase (Btk) family cytoplasmic tyrosine
kinase as a result of alternative exon usage. The
ficP mutation prevents the formation of the
type 2 isoform but leaves expression of the type 1 transcript intact.
Ubiquitous overexpression of the wild-type cDNA by using a heat shock
70 promoter during the late larval or pupal stages rescued the life
span and genital defects in the mutant, respectively, establishing the
causal relationship between the ficP phenotypes
and the Btk gene mutation. The stage specificity of the
rescuing ability suggests that the Btk gene is required for the development of male genitalia and substrates required for adult survival.
0270-7306/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.
The Drosophila Bruton's Tyrosine Kinase
(Btk) Homolog Is Required for Adult Survival and Male Genital
Formation
*
Corresponding author. Mailing address: ERATO Yamamoto
Behavior Genes Project at Mitsubishi Kasei Institute of Life Sciences, 11 Minamiooya, Machida, Tokyo 194-8511, Japan. Phone: 81-427-21-2334. Fax: 81-427-21-2850. E-mail:
daichan{at}fly.erato.jst.go.jp.
Present address: School of Human Sciences, Waseda University,
Tokorozawa, Saitama 359-1192, Japan.
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