Cell-cell adhesion and intracellular signaling during early embryogenesis in C. elegans

Cell-cell adhesion proteins are key players in development and disease. Starting at early embryogenesis, combined functions of adhesion proteins regulate cell shape changes and cell movements by mediating dynamic adhesions and by interacting with intracellular signaling and cytoskeletal components. C. elegans is an excellent model to study such events as worm embryos show dynamic adhesions at the very early stages and this organism is exceptional in its ability to be subjected to both genetic and cell manipulations.

To date very little is known in C. elegans about the identity of adhesion proteins that function in early embryogenesis. I have taken a reverse genetic approach and established a set of assays to screen candidate adhesion proteins for redundant functions. To tackle redundancy I knocked down pools of cadidate proteins using RNAi. Using this strategy, I found that specific adhesion proteins act redundantly with Rac signaling to regulate ingression of the endodermal precursor cells into the interior of the embryo, the first morphogenetic movements in C. elegans.

My long term goal is to study how adhesion proteins interact with intracellular signaling and the cytoskeleton at the cellular level. I plan to identify new cell adhesion proteins that function during these stages and to use assays developed in my preliminary work to explore the mechanisms by which these adhesion proteins act.