Jia Qiangqiang, Liu Yang, Liu Hanhan, Li Sheng
Key Laboratory of Insect Developmental and Evolutionary Biology, Institute of Plant Physiology and Ecology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200032, China.
Sci Rep. 2014 Dec 18;4:7535. doi: 10.1038/srep07535.
During Drosophila metamorphosis, the single-cell layer of fat body tissues gradually dissociates into individual cells. Via a fat body-specific RNAi screen in this study, we found that two matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs), Mmp1 and Mmp2, are both required for fat body cell dissociation. As revealed through a series of cellular, biochemical, molecular, and genetic experiments, Mmp1 preferentially cleaves DE-cadherin-mediated cell-cell junctions, while Mmp2 preferentially degrades basement membrane (BM) components and thus destroy cell-BM junctions, resulting in the complete dissociation of the entire fat body tissues into individual cells. Moreover, several genetic interaction experiments demonstrated that the roles of Mmp1 and Mmp2 in this developmental process are cooperative. In conclusion, Mmp1 and Mmp2 induce fat body cell dissociation during Drosophila metamorphosis in a cooperative yet distinct manner, a finding that sheds light on the general mechanisms by which MMPs regulate tissue remodeling in animals.
在果蝇变态发育过程中，脂肪体组织的单细胞层逐渐解离为单个细胞。通过本研究中针对脂肪体的RNA干扰筛选，我们发现两种基质金属蛋白酶（MMPs），即Mmp1和Mmp2，对于脂肪体细胞解离都是必需的。通过一系列细胞、生化、分子和遗传学实验表明，Mmp1优先切割DE-钙黏蛋白介导的细胞间连接，而Mmp2优先降解基底膜（BM）成分，从而破坏细胞与BM的连接，导致整个脂肪体组织完全解离为单个细胞。此外，一些遗传相互作用实验表明，Mmp1和Mmp2在这个发育过程中的作用是协同的。总之，Mmp1和Mmp2以协同但不同的方式诱导果蝇变态发育过程中的脂肪体细胞解离，这一发现揭示了MMPs调节动物组织重塑的一般机制。
