Regulation of temporal patterning during Drosophila visual system development

Neuronal diversity can be achieved through several mechanisms such as spatial or temporal patterning. Temporal patterning refers to the changing capacity of neuronal stem cells to generate different neuronal types at different developmental timepoints, which usually relies on the expression of a series of temporal transcription factors. Temporal patterning has been very well-studied in the Drosophila visual system. Interestingly, two different regions of the neurogenic epithelium of the developing visual system exhibit slightly different temporal series. During my thesis, I showed that two evolutionarily conserved transcription factors (Sp1 and Btd, the Drosophila orthologues of the human genes SP6-9 and SP5 ) are expressed differentially between these two regions. I am currently testing their regulation by Wnt signaling (which is prominent in this region), the involvement of Sp1 and Btd in the differentiation of the temporal series of transcription factors.