P-element transformation with period locus DNA restores rhythmicity to mutant, arrhythmic drosophila melanogaster

Abstract

Mutations at the period (per) locus of Drosophila melanogaster disrupt several biological rhythms. Molecular cloning of DNA sequences encompassing the per+ locus has allowed germ-line transformation experiments to be carried out. Certain subsegments of the per region, transduced into the genome of arrhythmic pero flies, restore rhythmicity in circadian locomotor behavior and the male's courtship song.

Failure to reproduce period -dependent song cycles in Drosophila is due to poor automated pulse-detection and low-intensity courtship

“…Those few courtships in which one-third or more 10-s bins were empty (<10 IPIs) were not analyzed. The results from several studies (including several performed blind) revealed repeatedly and consistently that wildtype flies sang with ∼50-to 65-s cycles, and that these periods were altered by per mutations (2,(6)(7)(8)12).Using different methods, Alt et al (18) obtained similar results to the original song-cycle work, whereas Ritchie et al (19) replicated and extended the playback experiments. It also became apparent that song cycles could be masked under conditions where the male and female were confined in small cells, when inappropriate upper IPI cut-off limits were used, or when gaps in the song record were artificially added (9,20,21).…”

“…The pulses have a variable interpulse interval (IPI), which ranges from 15 to 80 ms but usually averages between 30 and 40 ms, whereas sympatric Drosophila simulans mean IPIs vary from 45 to 80 ms depending on the strain (2,3). In 1980, in these pages, the first of a series of studies by Kyriacou, Hall, and their collaborators revealed that superimposed on these IPIs was a low-amplitude oscillation of about 60 s in D. melanogaster and 40 s in D. simulans (4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9)(10)(11)(12). Furthermore, in D. melanogaster, these cycles were modulated in a predictable fashion by the circadian rhythm period (per) mutations (13): per L males with long 29-h circadian cycles also sang with long ∼80-s song cycles, whereas circadian arrhythmic per 01 males showed a corresponding song phenotype (2,4,9,10).…”

Plant Circadian Rhythms

“…However, mutations conferring altered period length were identified and characterized in the fruitfly Drosophila melanogaster (Konopka and Benzer, 1971), the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (Bruce, 1972), and the filamentous fungus N. crassa (Feldman and Hoyle, 1973). It took more than a decade to clone the first clock gene, the Drosophila period (per) gene (Bargiello and Young, 1984;Zehring et al, 1984), and another 5 years to clone the second, the Neurospora frequency gene (McClung et al, 1989). However, the decade of the 1990s saw rapid progress toward the identification of clock components and the elucidation of oscillator mechanisms central to the circadian clock in a number of organisms, most notably Drosophila, Neurospora, and mice (Dunlap, 1999).…”

Profile of Jeffrey C. Hall

“…In 1984, Hall and his colleagues found and isolated the period gene (8), roughly at the same time as did Young's group (9). Soon after the period gene was cloned, its protein product was found not to be a homolog of any known protein.…”