Elucidating the Functional Contribution of the TGF-ß Signaling to Drosophila melanogaster Anti-nematode Immune Response
Open AccessThe nematode parasite Heterorhabditis together with its mutualistic bacteria Photorhabdus and the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster constitute a unique model to dissect the molecular basis of infection in relation to the host immune and metabolic response. Over the past years, information about the genes and signaling pathways that contribute to the anti-nematode immune response of Drosophila has been accumulated through genomic and transcriptomic approaches leading the way to studies aimed at elucidating the functions of key immune components. To this end, I studied the functional contribution of the TGF-ß signaling in Drosophila anti-Heterorhabditis response to further investigate its previously implicated role in immunity. My results have demonstrated that through its extracellular ligands, TGF-ß signaling regulates the number of immune cell populations, melanization cascade activity, and production of reactive oxygen species in Drosophila larvae during infection with Heterorhabditis gerrardi and H. bacteriophora nematodes. Because TGF-ß signaling components are expressed in metabolically active tissues in invertebrates, I further investigated the role and regulation of TGF-β signaling in Drosophila metabolic response against parasitic nematodes. My results have shown that following Heterorhabditis bacteriophora infection, TGF-β signaling mediates lipid metabolism and alters the size of lipid droplets in Drosophila larvae in addition to modulating sugar metabolism. Overall, these findings provide important insight into the role of TGF-ß signaling in linking host immunity and metabolism in the context of parasitic nematode infection and thus may lead to the identification of new strategies for treating infectious diseases.
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