Single-cell transcriptomics of the Drosophila wing disc reveals instructive epithelium-to-myoblast interactions
- University of California, Berkeley, United States
Abstract
In both vertebrates and invertebrates, generating a functional appendage requires interactions between ectoderm-derived epithelia and mesoderm-derived cells. To investigate such interactions, we used single-cell transcriptomics to generate a temporal cell atlas of the Drosophila wing disc from two developmental time points. Using these data, we visualized gene expression using a multi-layered model of the wing disc and catalogued ligand-receptor pairs that could mediate signaling between epithelial cells and adult muscle precursors (AMPs). We found that localized expression of the FGF ligands, Thisbe and Pyramus, in the disc epithelium regulates the number and location of the AMPs. In addition, Hedgehog ligand from the epithelium activates a specific transcriptional program within adjacent AMP cells, defined by AMP-specific targets Neurotactin and midline, that is critical for proper formation of direct flight muscles. More generally, our annotated temporal cell atlas provides an organ-wide view of potential cell-cell interactions between epithelial and myogenic cells.
Data availability
Sequencing data and aligned matrices have deposited in GEO (accession code GSE155543). Code will be accessible at https://github.com/HariharanLab/Everetts_Worley_Yasutomi. All other data generated are included in the manuscript and supporting files.
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Author details
Funding
National Institutes of Health (R35 GM122490)
- Iswar K Hariharan
The funders had no role in study design, data collection and interpretation, or the decision to submit the work for publication.
Copyright
© 2021, Everetts 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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Single-cell transcriptomics of the Drosophila wing disc reveals instructive epithelium-to-myoblast interactions
eLife 10:e61276.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.61276
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