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Lighting Up Gene Activation in Living Drosophila Embryos

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Imaging Gene Expression

Part of the book series: Methods in Molecular Biology ((MIMB,volume 2038))

Abstract

With its rapid development, ease of collection, and the presence of a unique layer of nuclei located close to the surface, the Drosophila syncytial embryo is ideally suited to study the establishment of gene expression patterns during development. Recent improvements in RNA labeling technologies and confocal microscopy allow for visualizing gene activation and quantifying transcriptional dynamics in living Drosophila embryos. Here we review the available tools for mRNA fluorescent labeling and detection in live embryos and precisely describe the overall procedure, from design to mounting and confocal imaging.

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Acknowledgments

We are very grateful to J. Dufourt for critical reading and insightful suggestions on the manuscript. We thank M. Bellec, M. Dejean, and A. Trullo for helpful discussions. We acknowledge the imaging facility MRI, member of the national infrastructure France-BioImaging supported by the French National Research Agency (ANR-10-INBS-04, “Investments for the future”). The ERC SyncDev and HFSP-CDA grants supported this work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institut de Génétique Moléculaire de Montpellier, University of Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, Cedex 5, France

    Carola Fernandez & Mounia Lagha

Authors
  1. Carola Fernandez
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  2. Mounia Lagha
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Mounia Lagha .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. The Mina & Everard Goodman, Faculty of Life Sciences and the Institute of Nanotechnology and Advanced Materials, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel

    Yaron Shav-Tal

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Fernandez, C., Lagha, M. (2019). Lighting Up Gene Activation in Living Drosophila Embryos. In: Shav-Tal, Y. (eds) Imaging Gene Expression. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol 2038. Humana, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-9674-2_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-9674-2_5

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  • Publisher Name: Humana, New York, NY

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-4939-9673-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4939-9674-2

  • eBook Packages: Springer Protocols

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