Ability of scalloped deletion constructs to rescue sd mutant wing phenotypes in Drosophila melanogaster

Scalloped (SD) and Vestigial (VG) proteins physically interact to form a selector complex that activates genes involved in wing development in Drosophila melanogaster. SD belongs to a conserved family of transcription factors containing the TEA/ATTS DNA-binding motif. VG is also a nuclear protein providing the activator function for the SD-VG complex. The TEA DNA-binding domain and the VG interacting domain (VID) of SD have been previously identified and described. However, they, and possibly other functional domains of SD, have not been thoroughly characterized in vivo. Herein, transgenic constructs encoding various truncations of SD were used to assess their respective ability to rescue the mutant wing phenotype of two viable sd recessive mutations (sd(ETX4) and sd58d). The transgenic strains produced were also tested for the ability to induce further sd expression, an ability possessed by full length SD. The functional dissection of SD confirms that specific regions are necessary for wing development and provides further information as to how the SD-VG complex functions to promote wing fate. Previous experiments have shown that expression of full length SD can cause a dominant negative wing phenotype. We show that expression of constructs that delete the SD DNA-binding domain can also cause a dominant negative phenotype in a background with either of the two tester sd strains. In contrast, SD constructs that delete the VID have no effect on the wing phenotype in either tester background. Finally, a significant portion of SD at the N-terminal end appears to be dispensable with respect to normal wing development, as this construct behaves the same as full length SD in our assays.