Morphogenesis of the vulva and the vulval-uterine connection
Abstract
The C. elegans hermaphrodite vulva is an established model system to study mechanisms of cell fate specification and tissue morphogenesis. The adult vulva is a tubular shaped organ composed of seven concentric toroids that arise from selective fusion between differentiated vulval progeny. The dorsal end of the vulval tubule is connected to the uterus via a multinucleate syncytium utse (uterine-seam) cell. The vulval tubule and utse are formed as a result of changes in morphogenetic processes such as cell polarity, adhesion, and invagination. A number of genes controlling these processes are conserved all the way up to human and function in similar developmental contexts. This makes it possible to extend the findings to other metazoan systems. Gene expression studies in the vulval and uterine cells have revealed the presence of regulatory networks specifying distinct cell fates. Thus, these two cell types serve as a good system to understand how gene networks confer unique cell identities both experimentally and computationally. This chapter focuses on morphogenetic processes during the formation of the vulva and its connection to uterus.
Additional Information
© 2012 Gupta et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Edited by Barbara Meyer. Last revised June 8, 2012. Published November 30, 2012. We thank members of our laboratories for discussion and feedback. BPG is supported by funds from NSERC, CIHR and Ministry of Research and Innovation (through ERA program). WHR is supported by R01 GM086786 from the NIH and IOS-071867 from the NSF. PWS is an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.Attached Files
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Additional details
- PMCID
- PMC5402222
- Eprint ID
- 95439
- Resolver ID
- CaltechAUTHORS:20190513-132517279
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)
- Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR)
- Ontario Ministry of Research and Innovation
- NIH
- R01 GM086786
- NSF
- IOS-071867
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI)
- Created
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2019-05-13Created from EPrint's datestamp field
- Updated
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2021-11-16Created from EPrint's last_modified field