Characterization of the female-sterile mutantAlmondex of Drosophila melanogaster

✍ Scribed by M. P. Shannon

• Book ID: 104630894
• Publisher: Springer Netherlands
• Year: 1972
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 611 KB
• Volume: 43
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0016-6707
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00123632

✦ Synopsis

Drosophila melanogaster females homozygous for the sex-linked recessive mutation almondex (amx) are completely sterile when mated to amx males. Matings of amx ~ × + ~ yield low numbers of heterozygous female offspring, which frequently show abnormalities of the thorax and abdominal sternites, and an occasional non-disjunctional, non-mutant (XO) male offspring. The results of mating experiments reported here can be explained by assuming that the cytoplasm of eggs produced by amx females is deficient for some material that is necessary for normal development.

Homozygous amx females have apparently normal reproductive organs and a high egg yield. Eggs are usually fertilized. In matings to amx males, all zygotes die as embryos; in matings to non-amx males, all ordinary (XY) male zygotes and most female zygotes die as embryos. Survival to the adult stage is more frequent at higher temperatures and, surprisingly, increases also with maternal age.