Escargot a Snail superfamily member and its multiple roles in Drosophila melanogaster development.

The Snail superfamily of transcription factors plays a crucial role in metazoan development; one of the most important vertebrate members of this family is Snai1 which is orthologous to the Drosophila melanogaster esg gene. This review offers a comprehensive examination of the roles of the esg gene in Drosophila development, covering its expression pattern and downstream targets, and draws parallels between the vertebrate Snai1 family proteins on controlling the epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition and esg. This gene regulates stemness, ploidy, and pluripontency. esg is expressed in various tissues during development, including the gut, imaginal discs, and neuroblasts. The functions of the esg include the suppression of differentiation in intestinal stem cells and the preservation of diploidy in imaginal cells. In the nervous system development, esg expression also inhibits neuroblast differentiation, thus regulating the number of neurons and the moment in development of neuronal differentiation. Loss of esg function results in diverse developmental defects, including defects in intestinal stem cell maintenance and differentiation, and alters imaginal disc and nervous system development. Expression levels of esg also play a role in regulating longevity and metabolism in adult stages. This review provides an overview of the current understanding of esg's developmental role, emphasizing cellular and tissue effects that arise from its loss of function. The insights gained may contribute to a better understanding of evolutionary conserved developmental mechanisms and certain metabolic diseases.

Parkinsonian phenotypes induced by Synphilin-1 expression are differentially contributed by serotonergic and dopaminergic circuits and suppressed by nicotine treatment.

Synphilin-1 is a protein encoded by the human SNCAIP gene whose function has yet to be fully understood. However, it has been linked to familial Parkinson's disease (PD). Synphilin-1 is a major component of the Lewy bodies found in neurons in the substantia nigra pars compacta of PD patients. Synphilin-1 expression in serotonergic and/or dopaminergic neurons of Drosophila melanogaster induces neurodegeneration, as well as motor and non-motor PD like symptoms. In this work, we examined the contribution of the serotonergic and dopaminergic circuits in the development of PD-like phenotypes. We found that olfactory and visual symptoms are majorly contributed by the serotonergic system, and that motor symptoms and reduction in survival are mainly contributed by the dopaminergic system. Chronic nicotine treatment was able to suppress several of these symptoms. These results indicate that both the serotonergic and dopaminergic systems contribute to different aspects of PD symptomatology and that nicotine has beneficial effects on specific symptoms.