Organisms are made up of thousands of different cell types that must migrate, proliferate, and interact with each other to yield functional organ systems and ultimately a viable organism. A characteristic that distinguishes one cell type from another is the set of genes that it expresses. An article by Hartman et al. in the April 2015 issue of GENETICS identified methods to uniquely identify different cell populations during oogenesis, providing valuable tools for future studies. This Primer article provides background information on the Drosophila ovary as a system in which to study stem cell regulation, mechanisms for regulating gene expression, and the techniques used by Hartman et al. to identify specific cell populations and study their function.
Keywords: Drosophila melanogaster; follicle stem cell; integrin; ovary; transcriptional regulatory elements.
Copyright © 2015 by the Genetics Society of America.