Drosophila indirect flight muscle specific Act88F actin mutants as a model system for studying congenital myopathies of the human ACTA1 skeletal muscle actin gene

Haigh, Sarah E and Salvi, Sheetal S and Sevdali, Maria and Stark, Meg and Goulding, David and Clayton, Jonathan D and Bullard, Belinda and Sparrow, John C and Nongthomba, Upendra (2010) Drosophila indirect flight muscle specific Act88F actin mutants as a model system for studying congenital myopathies of the human ACTA1 skeletal muscle actin gene. In: Neuromuscular Disorders, 20 (6). pp. 363-374.

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Abstract

Most human ACTA1 skeletal actin gene mutations cause dominant, congenital myopathies often with severely reduced muscle function and neonatal mortality. High sequence conservation of actin means many mutated ACTA1 residues are identical to those in the Drosophila Act88F, an indirect flight muscle specific sarcomeric actin. Four known Act88F mutations occur at the same actin residues mutated in ten ACTA1 nemaline mutations, A138D/P, R256H/L, G268C/D/R/S and R372C/S. These Act88F mutants were examined for similar muscle phenotypes. Mutant homozygotes show phenotypes ranging from a lack of myofibrils to almost normal sarcomeres at eclosion. Aberrant Z-disc-like structures and serial Z-disc arrays, ‘zebra bodies’, are observed in homozygotes and heterozygotes of all four Act88F mutants. These electron-dense structures show homologies to human nemaline bodies/rods, but are much smaller than those typically found in the human myopathy. We conclude that the Drosophila indirect flight muscles provide a good model system for studying ACTA1 mutations.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Neuromuscular Disorders
Publisher:	Elsevier Science
Additional Information:	Copyright of this article belongs to Elsevier Science.
Keywords:	Drosophila;Muscle;Nemaline rods;Zebra bodies
Department/Centre:	Division of Biological Sciences > Molecular Reproduction, Development & Genetics
Date Deposited:	12 Jul 2010 11:05
Last Modified:	20 Oct 2011 05:52
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/29192

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