Silencing of Toll pathway components by direct injection of double-stranded RNA into Drosophila adult flies.

ABSTRACT: Double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) gene interference is an efficient method to silence gene expression in a sequence-specific manner. Here we show that the direct injection of dsRNA can be used in adult Drosophila flies to disrupt function of endogenous genes in vivo. As a proof of principle, we have used this method to silence components of a major signaling cascade, the Toll pathway, which controls fruit fly resistance to fungal and Gram-positive bacterial infections. We demonstrate that the knockout is efficient only if dsRNA is injected in 4- or more day-old flies and that it lasts for at least 1 week. Furthermore, we report dsRNA-based epistatic gene analysis via injection of a mixture of two dsRNAs and propose that injection of dsRNA represents a powerful method for rapid functional analysi

SUBMITTER: Goto A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC275548 | biostudies-literature | 2003 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature