1. Chromosomes and Gene Expression
  2. Neuroscience

FlpStop, a tool for conditional gene control in Drosophila

  1. Yvette Erica Fisher
  2. Helen H Yang
  3. Jesse Isaacman-Beck
  4. Marjorie Xie
  5. Daryl M Gohl
  6. Thomas R Clandinin  Is a corresponding author
  1. Harvard Medical School, United States
  2. Stanford University, United States
  3. University of Minnesota Genomics Center, United States
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22279
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  1. Yvette Erica Fisher
  2. Helen H Yang
  3. Jesse Isaacman-Beck
  4. Marjorie Xie
  5. Daryl M Gohl
  6. Thomas R Clandinin
(2017)
FlpStop, a tool for conditional gene control in Drosophila
eLife 6:e22279.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22279
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Abstract

Manipulating gene function cell type-specifically is a common experimental goal in Drosophila research and has been central to studies of neural development, circuit computation, and behavior. However, current cell type-specific gene disruption techniques in flies often reduce gene activity incompletely or rely on cell division. Here we describe FlpStop, a generalizable tool for conditional gene disruption and rescue in post-mitotic cells. In proof-of-principle experiments, we manipulated apterous, a regulator of wing development. Next, we produced conditional null alleles of Glutamic acid decarboxylase 1(Gad1) and Resistant to dieldrin (Rdl), genes vital for GABAergic neurotransmission, as well as cacophony (cac) and paralytic (para), voltage-gated ion channels central to neuronal excitability. To demonstrate the utility of this approach, we manipulated cac in a specific visual interneuron type and discovered differential regulation of calcium signals across subcellular compartments. Thus, FlpStop will facilitate investigations into the interactions between genes, circuits, and computation.

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Author details

  1. Yvette Erica Fisher

    Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

  2. Helen H Yang

    Department of Neurobiology, Stanford University, Stanford, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-5140-9664

  3. Jesse Isaacman-Beck

    Department of Neurobiology, Stanford University, Stanford, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

  4. Marjorie Xie

    Department of Neurobiology, Stanford University, Stanford, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

  5. Daryl M Gohl

    University of Minnesota Genomics Center, Minneapolis, United States
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.

  6. Thomas R Clandinin

    Department of Neurobiology, Stanford University, Stanford, United States
    For correspondence
    trc@stanford.edu
    Competing interests
    The authors declare that no competing interests exist.
    ORCID icon "This ORCID iD identifies the author of this article:" 0000-0001-6277-6849

Funding

National Eye Institute (R01 EY022638)

  • Thomas R Clandinin

National Institute of Mental Health (U01 MH109119)

  • Thomas R Clandinin

National Science Foundation

  • Yvette Erica Fisher

Stanford University School of Medicine

  • Helen H Yang

National Eye Institute (F32EY020040)

  • Daryl M Gohl

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.

Copyright

© 2017, Fisher et al.

This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License permitting unrestricted use and redistribution provided that the original author and source are credited.

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  1. Yvette Erica Fisher
  2. Helen H Yang
  3. Jesse Isaacman-Beck
  4. Marjorie Xie
  5. Daryl M Gohl
  6. Thomas R Clandinin
(2017)
FlpStop, a tool for conditional gene control in Drosophila
eLife 6:e22279.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22279

Share this article

https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.22279

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