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Intestinal stem cell, muscular niche and Wingless signaling

Guonan Lin and Rongwen Xi

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Stem cells are typically supported by local tissue microenvironment named niche. Intestinal stem cells (ISCs) in the Drosophila midgut do not seem to be typical: they are scattered along the basement membrane composed of extracellular matrix, and are not associated with any obvious cellular niches. In addition, regulatory mechanisms controlling ISC self-renewal remain unknown. Recently, we have obtained evidence to show that Wingless signaling is critical for ISC self-renewal. Wingless is specifically produced from the underlying circular muscles and is able to transverse through the basement membrane and reach ISCs, where it activates a canonical Wnt signaling pathway to promote ISC self-renewal. Our study reveals a muscular niche for ISCs and Wnt signaling as a conserved mechanism regulating ISC self-renewal from Drosophila to mammals. Here we provide a brief overview of our findings, and discuss future perspectives on the regulatory mechanisms underlying ISC self-renewal and differentiation.

Guonan Lin, Na Xu, Rongwen Xi. Paracrine Wingless signalling controls self-renewal of Drosophila intestinal stem cells. Nature 2008 Oct 23;455(7216):1119-23.

Authors

Guonan Lin

National Institute of Biological Sciences

Rongwen Xi Corresponding author: xirongwen@nibs.ac.cn

National Institute of Biological Sciences

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