Pleiotropic Roles of the Orthologue of the Drosophila melanogaster Intersex Gene in the Brown Planthopper.

ABSTRACT: Intersex(ix), a gene involved in the sex-determining cascade of Drosophila melanogaster, works in concert with the female-specific product of doublesex (dsx) at the end of the hierarchy to implement the sex-specific differentiation of sexually dimorphic characters in female individuals. In this study, the ix homolog was identified in the brown planthopper (BPH), Nilaparvata lugens, which contained two splice variants expressed in both female and male insects. We found that Nlix played a vital role in the early nymphal development of BPH, showing an accumulated effect. RNAi-mediated knockdown of Nlix at 4th instar led to the external genital defects in both sexes, consequently resulting in the loss of reproductive ability in fem

SUBMITTER: Zhang HH 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8000406 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature