Fly sex drive traced to fru gene
Roush, W.
Science 274(5294): 1836
1996
ISSN/ISBN: 0036-8075 PMID: 8984640 Document Number: 460247
Most of the complex mating repertory of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster is controlled by a single gene. Geneticist Jeff Hall first showed in the 1970s that the gene, called fruitless (fru), influences sexual preference and that males with a mutation in the gene court males and females. Now, in a new study, which appears in the current issue of Cell, a multiuniversity team reports that males with severe mutations in the gene are not just indiscriminate but are sexless. This finding, together with evidence that the protein encoded by fru can switch other genes on and off and is present in only a few nerve cells, suggests that fru is a high-level regulatory gene that somehow equips specific centers in the brain to coordinate male courtship behavior, the researchers say.