A link between impaired purine nucleotide synthesis and apoptosis in Drosophila melanogaster.

ABSTRACT: The biosynthetic pathways and multiple functions of purine nucleotides are well known. However, the pathways that respond to alterations in purine nucleotide synthesis in vivo in an animal model organism have not been identified. We examined the effects of inhibiting purine de novo synthesis in vivo and in cultured cells of Drosophila melanogaster. The purine de novo synthesis gene ade2 encodes phosphoribosylformylglycinamidine synthase (EC 6.3.5.3). An ade2 deletion, generated by P-element transposon excision, causes lethality in early pupal development, with darkening, or necrosis, of leg and wing imaginal disc tissue upon disc eversion. Together with analysis of a previously isolated weaker allele, ade2(4), and an allele of the Prat gene, which encodes an enzyme for the first step in th

SUBMITTER: Holland C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3122316 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature