Diacylglycerol kinase defect in a Drosophila retinal degeneration mutant rdgA.

The Drosophila visual mutant rdgA is known to show age-dependent retinal degeneration with defective diacylglycerol (DG) kinase activity. In this study we examined DG kinase activity of several visual mutants and found that only rdgA mutant eyes showed the lack of DG kinase activity in a gene dosage-dependent manner. The enzyme activity is already absent at the time of eclosion from pupal case when the degeneration is not yet apparent. To examine whether rdgA gene dosage effect holds for other enzymes related to the phosphatidylinositol turnover, phospholipase C was analyzed which did not show any gene dosage effect. Therefore, it is strongly suggested that rdgA gene correlates closely with DG kinase activity, and the defect of DG kinase activity is a primary cause of retinal degeneration in rdgA mutant.