dorsal/arxiv
View SchemaFinding the center reliably: robust patterns of developmental gene expression
| Authors | Martin Howard, Pieter Rein ten Wolde |
|---|---|
| Categories | |
| ArXiv ID | q-bio/0511011 |
| URL | https://arxiv.org/abs/q-bio/0511011 |
| DOI | 10.1103/PhysRevLett.95.208103 |
| Journal | Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 208103 (2005) |
Abstract
We investigate a mechanism for the robust identification of the center of a developing biological system. We assume the existence of two morphogen gradients, an activator emanating from the anterior, and a co-repressor from the posterior. The co-repressor inhibits the action of the activator in switching on target genes. We apply this system to Drosophila embryos, where we predict the existence of a hitherto undetected posterior co-repressor. Using mathematical modelling, we show that a symmetric activator-co-repressor model can quantitatively explain the precise mid-embryo expression boundary of the hunchback gene, and the scaling of this pattern with embryo size.
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"abstract": "We investigate a mechanism for the robust identification of the center of a\ndeveloping biological system. We assume the existence of two morphogen\ngradients, an activator emanating from the anterior, and a co-repressor from\nthe posterior. The co-repressor inhibits the action of the activator in\nswitching on target genes. We apply this system to Drosophila embryos, where we\npredict the existence of a hitherto undetected posterior co-repressor. Using\nmathematical modelling, we show that a symmetric activator-co-repressor model\ncan quantitatively explain the precise mid-embryo expression boundary of the\nhunchback gene, and the scaling of this pattern with embryo size.",
"arxiv_id": "q-bio/0511011",
"authors": [
"Martin Howard",
"Pieter Rein ten Wolde"
],
"categories": [
"q-bio.TO",
"cond-mat.other",
"cond-mat.stat-mech",
"q-bio.OT"
],
"doi": "10.1103/PhysRevLett.95.208103",
"journal_ref": "Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 208103 (2005)",
"title": "Finding the center reliably: robust patterns of developmental gene expression",
"url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/q-bio/0511011"
},
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