Drosophila innate immune response pathways moonlight in neurodegeneration

Dnr1 mutations cause neurodegeneration in Drosophila by activating the innate immune response in the brain.

A growing body of evidence in humans implicates chronic activation of the innate immune response in the brain as a major cause of neuropathology in various neurodegenerative conditions, although the mechanisms remain unclear. In an unbiased genetic screen for mutants exhibiting neurodegeneration in Drosophila, we have recovered a mutation of dnr1 (defense repressor 1), a negative regulator of t...

Toll and IMD pathways synergistically activate an innate immune response in Drosophila melanogaster.

The inducible expression of antimicrobial peptide genes in Drosophila melanogaster is regulated by the conserved Toll and peptidoglycan recognition protein LC/immune deficiency (PGRP-LC/IMD) signaling pathways. It has been proposed that the two pathways have independent functions and mediate the specificity of innate immune responses towards different microorganisms. Scattered evidence also sug...

The innate immune response transcription factor relish is necessary for neurodegeneration in a Drosophila model of ataxia-telangiectasia.

Neurodegeneration is a hallmark of the human disease ataxia-telangiectasia (A-T) that is caused by mutation of the A-T mutated (ATM) gene. We have analyzed Drosophila melanogaster ATM mutants to determine the molecular mechanisms underlying neurodegeneration in A-T. Previously, we found that ATM mutants upregulate the expression of innate immune response (IIR) genes and undergo neurodegeneratio...

SUMO-Enriched Proteome for Drosophila Innate Immune Response.

Small ubiquitin-like modifier (SUMO) modification modulates the expression of defense genes in Drosophila, activated by the Toll/nuclear factor-κB and immune-deficient/nuclear factor-κB signaling networks. We have, however, limited understanding of the SUMO-modulated regulation of the immune response and lack information on SUMO targets in the immune system. In this study, we measured the chang...

Integration of the DNA Damage Response with Innate Immune Pathways