A multiscale investigation of bicoid-dependent transcriptional events in Drosophila embryos

Detection and Quantification of the Bicoid Concentration Gradient in Drosophila Embryos

We describe methods for detecting and quantifying the concentration gradient of the morphogenetic protein Bicoid through fluorescent immunostaining in fixed Drosophila embryos. We introduce image-processing steps using MATLAB functions, and discuss how the measured signal intensities can be analyzed to extract quantitative information. The described procedures permit robust detection of the endogenous Bicoid concentration gradient at a cellular resolution.

Dissecting the sharp response of a canonical developmental enhancer reveals multiple sources of cooperativity

Developmental enhancers integrate graded concentrations of transcription factors (TFs) to create sharp gene expression boundaries. Here we examine the hunchback P2 (HbP2) enhancer which drives a sharp expression pattern in the Drosophila blastoderm embryo in response to the transcriptional activator Bicoid (Bcd). We systematically interrogate cis and trans factors that influence the shape and position of expression driven by HbP2, and find that the prevailing model, based on pairwise cooperative binding of Bcd to HbP2 is not adequate. We demonstrate that other proteins, such as pioneer factors, Mediator and histone modifiers influence the shape and position of the HbP2 expression pattern. Comparing our results to theory reveals how higher-order cooperativity and energy expenditure impact boundary location and sharpness. Our results emphasize that the bacterial view of transcription regulation, where pairwise interactions between regulatory proteins dominate, must be reexamined in animals, where multiple molecular mechanisms collaborate to shape the gene regulatory function.

The Drosophila Pioneer Factor Zelda Modulates the Nuclear Microenvironment of a Dorsal Target Enhancer to Potentiate Transcriptional Output

Connecting the developmental patterning of tissues to the mechanistic control of RNA polymerase II remains a long-term goal of developmental biology. Many key elements have been identified in the establishment of spatial-temporal control of transcription in the early Drosophila embryo, a model system for transcriptional regulation. The dorsal-ventral axis of the Drosophila embryo is determined by the graded distribution of Dorsal (Dl), a homolog of the nuclear factor κB (NF-κB) family of transcriptional activators found in humans [1, 2]. A second maternally deposited factor, Zelda (Zld), is uniformly distributed in the embryo and is thought to act as a pioneer factor, increasing enhancer accessibility for transcription factors, such as Dl [3-9]. Here, we utilized the MS2 live imaging system to evaluate the expression of the Dl target gene short gastrulation (sog) to better understand how a pioneer factor affects the kinetic parameters of transcription. Our experiments indicate that Zld modifies probability of activation, the timing of this activation, and the rate at which transcription occurs. Our results further show that this effective rate increase is due to an increased accumulation of Dl at the site of transcription, suggesting that transcription factor "hubs" induced by Zld [10] functionally regulate transcription.

Precision of Readout at the hunchback Gene: Analyzing Short Transcription Time Traces in Living Fly Embryos

The simultaneous expression of the hunchback gene in the numerous nuclei of the developing fly embryo gives us a unique opportunity to study how transcription is regulated in living organisms. A recently developed MS2-MCP technique for imaging nascent messenger RNA in living Drosophila embryos allows us to quantify the dynamics of the developmental transcription process. The initial measurement of the morphogens by the hunchback promoter takes place during very short cell cycles, not only giving each nucleus little time for a precise readout, but also resulting in short time traces of transcription. Additionally, the relationship between the measured signal and the promoter state depends on the molecular design of the reporting probe. We develop an analysis approach based on tailor made autocorrelation functions that overcomes the short trace problems and quantifies the dynamics of transcription initiation. Based on live imaging data, we identify signatures of bursty transcription initiation from the hunchback promoter. We show that the precision of the expression of the hunchback gene to measure its position along the anterior-posterior axis is low both at the boundary and in the anterior even at cycle 13, suggesting additional post-transcriptional averaging mechanisms to provide the precision observed in fixed embryos.

The fly embryo provides a natural laboratory to study the dynamics of transcription and its implications for the developing organism. Using live imaging experiments we investigate the nature of transcription regulation of the hunchback gene—the first to read out the maternal Bicoid gradient. While traditional time trace analysis methods based on OFF time distributions or autocorrelation functions fail for short signals, our tailored autocorrelation function overcomes these limitations revealing bursty dynamics that is reproducible between cell cycles and embryos. The inferred rates result in a lot of variability in the readout of nuclei sensing similar Bicoid concentrations, suggesting additional readout mechanisms than a one-to-one mapping of the input onto the output.

Time to move on: Modeling transcription dynamics during an embryonic transition away from maternal control

In a recent study, we investigated the regulation of hunchback (hb) transcription dynamics in Drosophila embryos. Our results suggest that shutdown of hb transcription at early nuclear cycle (nc) 14 is an event associated with the global changes taking place during the mid-blastula transition (MBT). Here we have developed a simple model of hb transcription dynamics during this transition time. With kinetic parameters estimated from our published experimental data, the model describes the dynamical processes of hb gene transcription and hb mRNA accumulation. With two steps, transcription onset upon exiting the previous mitosis followed by a sudden impact that blocks gene activation, the model recapitulates the observed dynamics of hb transcription during the nc14 interphase. The timing of gene inactivation is essential, as its alterations lead to changes in both hb transcription dynamics and hb mRNA levels. Our model provides a clear dynamical picture of hb transcription regulation as one of the many, actively regulated events concurrently taking place during the MBT.

Modulation of temporal dynamics of gene transcription by activator potency in the Drosophila embryo

The Drosophila embryo at the mid-blastula transition (MBT) concurrently experiences a receding first wave of zygotic transcription and the surge of a massive second wave. It is not well understood how genes in the first wave become turned off transcriptionally and how their precise timing may impact embryonic development. Here we perturb the timing of the shutdown of Bicoid (Bcd)-dependent hunchback (hb) transcription in the embryo through the use of a Bcd mutant that has heightened activating potency. A delayed shutdown specifically increases Bcd-activated hb levels, and this alters spatial characteristics of the patterning outcome and causes developmental defects. Our study thus documents a specific participation of maternal activator input strength in the timing of molecular events in precise accordance with MBT morphological progression.

Probing the impact of temperature on molecular events in a developmental system

A well-appreciated general feature of development is the ability to achieve a normal outcome despite the inevitable variability at molecular, genetic, or environmental levels. But it is not well understood how changes in a global factor such as temperature bring about specific challenges to a developmental system in molecular terms. Here we address this question using early Drosophila embryos where the maternal gradient Bicoid (Bcd) instructs anterior-patterning (AP) patterning. We show that temperature can impact the amplitude of the Bcd gradient in the embryo. To evaluate how molecular decisions are made at different temperatures, we quantify Bcd concentrations and the expression of its target gene hunchback (hb) in individual embryos. Our results suggest a relatively robust Bcd concentration threshold in inducing hb transcription within a temperature range. Our results also reveal a complex nature of the effects of temperature on the progressions of developmental and molecular events of the embryo. Our study thus advances the concept of developmental robustness by quantitatively elaborating specific features and challenges—imposed by changes in temperature—that an embryo must resolve.

Combining protein and mRNA quantification to decipher transcriptional regulation

We combine immunofluorescence and single-molecule fluorescence in situ hybridization (smFISH), followed by automated image analysis, to quantify the concentration of nuclear transcription factors, number of transcription factors bound, and number of nascent mRNAs synthesized at individual gene loci. A theoretical model is used to decipher how transcription-factor binding modulates the stochastic kinetics of mRNA production. We demonstrate this approach by examining the regulation of hunchback in the early Drosophila embryo.

Fundamental origins and limits for scaling a maternal morphogen gradient

Tissue expansion and patterning are integral to development, but it is unknown quantitatively how a mother accumulates molecular resources to invest in the future of instructing robust embryonic patterning. Here we develop a model, Tissue Expansion-Modulated Maternal Morphogen Scaling (TEM³S), to study scaled anterior-posterior patterning in Drosophila embryos. Using both ovaries and embryos, we measure a core quantity of the model, the scaling power of the Bicoid (Bcd) morphogen gradient’s amplitude n_A. We also evaluate directly model-derived predictions about Bcd gradient and patterning properties. Our results show that scaling of the Bcd gradient in the embryo originates from, and is constrained fundamentally by, a dynamic relationship between maternal tissue expansion and bcd gene copy number expansion in the ovary. This delicate connection between the two transitioning stages of a life cycle, stemming from a finite value of n_A ~ 3, underscores a key feature of developmental systems depicted by TEM³S.

Mid-embryo patterning and precision in Drosophila segmentation: Krüppel dual regulation of hunchback

In early development, genes are expressed in spatial patterns which later define cellular identities and tissue locations. The mechanisms of such pattern formation have been studied extensively in early Drosophila (fruit fly) embryos. The gap gene hunchback (hb) is one of the earliest genes to be expressed in anterior-posterior (AP) body segmentation. As a transcriptional regulator for a number of downstream genes, the spatial precision of hb expression can have significant effects in the development of the body plan. To investigate the factors contributing to hb precision, we used fine spatial and temporal resolution data to develop a quantitative model for the regulation of hb expression in the mid-embryo. In particular, modelling hb pattern refinement in mid nuclear cleavage cycle 14 (NC14) reveals some of the regulatory contributions of simultaneously-expressed gap genes. Matching the model to recent data from wild-type (WT) embryos and mutants of the gap gene Krüppel (Kr) indicates that a mid-embryo Hb concentration peak important in thoracic development (at parasegment 4, PS4) is regulated in a dual manner by Kr, with low Kr concentration activating hb and high Kr concentration repressing hb. The processes of gene expression (transcription, translation, transport) are intrinsically random. We used stochastic simulations to characterize the noise generated in hb expression. We find that Kr regulation can limit the positional variability of the Hb mid-embryo border. This has been recently corroborated in experimental comparisons of WT and Kr- mutant embryos. Further, Kr regulation can decrease uncertainty in mid-embryo hb expression (i.e. contribute to a smooth Hb boundary) and decrease between-copy transcriptional variability within nuclei. Since many tissue boundaries are first established by interactions between neighbouring gene expression domains, these properties of Hb-Kr dynamics to diminish the effects of intrinsic expression noise may represent a general mechanism contributing to robustness in early development.

Analytic approaches to stochastic gene expression in multicellular systems

Deterministic thermodynamic models of the complex systems, which control gene expression in metazoa, are helping researchers identify fundamental themes in the regulation of transcription. However, quantitative single cell studies are increasingly identifying regulatory mechanisms that control variability in expression. Such behaviors cannot be captured by deterministic models and are poorly suited to contemporary stochastic approaches that rely on continuum approximations, such as Langevin methods. Fortunately, theoretical advances in the modeling of transcription have assembled some general results that can be readily applied to systems being explored only through a deterministic approach. Here, I review some of the recent experimental evidence for the importance of genetically regulating stochastic effects during embryonic development and discuss key results from Markov theory that can be used to model this regulation. I then discuss several pairs of regulatory mechanisms recently investigated through a Markov approach. In each case, a deterministic treatment predicts no difference between the mechanisms, but the statistical treatment reveals the potential for substantially different distributions of transcriptional activity. In this light, features of gene regulation that seemed needlessly complex evolutionary baggage may be appreciated for their key contributions to reliability and precision of gene expression.

Adaptation of the length scale and amplitude of the Bicoid gradient profile to achieve robust patterning in abnormally large Drosophila melanogaster embryos

The formation of patterns that are proportional to the size of the embryo is an intriguing but poorly understood feature of development. Molecular mechanisms controlling such proportionality, or scaling, can be probed through quantitative interrogations of the properties of morphogen gradients that instruct patterning. Recent studies of the Drosophila morphogen gradient Bicoid (Bcd), which is required for anterior-posterior (AP) patterning in the early embryo, have uncovered two distinct ways of scaling. Whereas between-species scaling is achieved by adjusting the exponential shape characteristic of the Bcd gradient profile, namely, its length scale or length constant (λ), within-species scaling is achieved through adjusting the profile's amplitude, namely, the Bcd concentration at the anterior (B0). Here, we report a case in which Drosophila melanogaster embryos exhibit Bcd gradient properties uncharacteristic of their size. The embryos under investigation were from a pair of inbred lines that had been artificially selected for egg size extremes. We show that B0 in the large embryos is uncharacteristically low but λ is abnormally extended. Although the large embryos have more total bcd mRNA than their smaller counterparts, as expected, its distribution is unusually broad. We show that the large and small embryos develop gene expression patterns exhibiting boundaries that are proportional to their respective lengths. Our results suggest that the large-egg inbred line has acquired compensating properties that counteract the extreme length of the embryos to maintain Bcd gradient properties necessary for robust patterning. Our study documents, for the first time to our knowledge, a case of within-species Bcd scaling achieved through adjusting the gradient profile's exponential shape characteristic, illustrating at a molecular level how a developmental system can follow distinct operational paths towards the goal of robust and scaled patterning.

Uncovering a dynamic feature of the transcriptional regulatory network for anterior-posterior patterning in the Drosophila embryo

Anterior-posterior (AP) patterning in the Drosophila embryo is dependent on the Bicoid (Bcd) morphogen gradient. However, most target genes of Bcd also require additional inputs to establish their expression domains, reflective of the operation of a cross-regulatory network and contributions of other maternal signals. This is in contrast to hunchback (hb), which has an anterior expression domain driven by an enhancer that appears to respond primarily to the Bcd input. To gain a better understanding of the regulatory logic of the AP patterning network, we perform quantitative studies that specifically investigate the dynamics of hb transcription during development. We show that Bcd-dependent hb transcription, monitored by the intron-containing nascent transcripts near the P2 promoter, is turned off quickly–on the order of a few minutes–upon entering the interphase of nuclear cycle 14A. This shutdown contrasts with earlier cycles during which active hb transcription can persist until the moment when the nucleus enters mitosis. The shutdown takes place at a time when the nuclear Bcd gradient profile in the embryo remains largely intact, suggesting that this is a process likely subject to control of a currently unknown regulatory mechanism. We suggest that this dynamic feature offers a window of opportunity for hb to faithfully interpret, and directly benefit from, Bcd gradient properties, including its scaling properties, to help craft a robust AP patterning outcome.

A spatial point pattern analysis in Drosophila blastoderm embryos evaluating the potential inheritance of transcriptional states

The Drosophila blastoderm embryo undergoes rapid cycles of nuclear division. This poses a challenge to genes that need to reliably sense the concentrations of morphogen molecules to form desired expression patterns. Here we investigate whether the transcriptional state of hunchback (hb), a target gene directly activated by the morphogenetic protein Bicoid (Bcd), exhibits properties indicative of inheritance between mitotic cycles. To achieve this, we build a dataset of hb transcriptional states at the resolution of individual nuclei in embryos at early cycle 14. We perform a spatial point pattern (SPP) analysis to evaluate the spatial relationships among the nuclei that have distinct numbers of hb gene copies undergoing active transcription in snapshots of embryos. Our statistical tests and simulation studies reveal properties of dispersed clustering for nuclei with both or neither copies of hb undergoing active transcription. Modeling of nuclear lineages from cycle 11 to cycle 14 suggests that these two types of nuclei can achieve spatial clustering when, and only when, the transcriptional states are allowed to propagate between mitotic cycles. Our results are consistent with the possibility where the positional information encoded by the Bcd morphogen gradient may not need to be decoded de novo at all mitotic cycles in the Drosophila blastoderm embryo.

Dampened regulates the activating potency of Bicoid and the embryonic patterning outcome in Drosophila

The Drosophila morphogen gradient of Bicoid (Bcd) initiates anterior-posterior (AP) patterning; however, it is poorly understood how its ability to activate a target gene may have an impact on this process. Here we report an F-box protein, Dampened (Dmpd) as a nuclear cofactor of Bcd that can enhance its activating potency. We establish a quantitative platform to specifically investigate two parameters of a Bcd target gene response, expression amplitude and boundary position. We show that embryos lacking Dmpd have a reduced amplitude of Bcd-activated hunchback (hb) expression at a critical time of development. This is because of a reduced Bcd-dependent transcribing probability. This defect is faithfully propagated further downstream of the AP-patterning network to alter the spatial characteristics of even-skipped (eve) stripes. Thus, unlike another Bcd-interacting F-box protein Fate-shifted (Fsd), which controls AP patterning through regulating the Bcd gradient profile, Dmpd achieves its patterning role through regulating the activating potency of Bcd.

Mutual repression enhances the steepness and precision of gene expression boundaries

Embryonic development is driven by spatial patterns of gene expression that determine the fate of each cell in the embryo. While gene expression is often highly erratic, embryonic development is usually exceedingly precise. In particular, gene expression boundaries are robust not only against intra-embryonic fluctuations such as noise in gene expression and protein diffusion, but also against embryo-to-embryo variations in the morphogen gradients, which provide positional information to the differentiating cells. How development is robust against intra- and inter-embryonic variations is not understood. A common motif in the gene regulation networks that control embryonic development is mutual repression between pairs of genes. To assess the role of mutual repression in the robust formation of gene expression patterns, we have performed large-scale stochastic simulations of a minimal model of two mutually repressing gap genes in Drosophila, hunchback (hb) and knirps (kni). Our model includes not only mutual repression between hb and kni, but also the stochastic and cooperative activation of hb by the anterior morphogen Bicoid (Bcd) and of kni by the posterior morphogen Caudal (Cad), as well as the diffusion of Hb and Kni between neighboring nuclei. Our analysis reveals that mutual repression can markedly increase the steepness and precision of the gap gene expression boundaries. In contrast to other mechanisms such as spatial averaging and cooperative gene activation, mutual repression thus allows for gene-expression boundaries that are both steep and precise. Moreover, mutual repression dramatically enhances their robustness against embryo-to-embryo variations in the morphogen levels. Finally, our simulations reveal that diffusion of the gap proteins plays a critical role not only in reducing the width of the gap gene expression boundaries via the mechanism of spatial averaging, but also in repairing patterning errors that could arise because of the bistability induced by mutual repression.

The role of Bicoid cooperative binding in the patterning of sharp borders in Drosophila melanogaster

In Drosophila embryonic development, the Bicoid (Bcd) protein establishes positional information of downstream developmental genes like hunchback (hb), which has a strong anterior expression and a sharp on-off boundary in the mid-embryo. The role of Bcd cooperative binding in the positioning of the Hb pattern has been previously demonstrated. However, there are discrepancies in the reported results about the role of this mechanism in the sharp Hb border. Here, we determined the Hill coefficient (nH) required for Bcd to generate the sharp border of Hb in wild-type (WT) embryos. We found that an n(H) of approximately 6.3 (s.d. 1.4) and 10.8 (s.d. 4.0) is required to account for Hb sharpness at early and late cycle 14A, respectively. Additional mechanisms are possibly required because the high nH is likely unachievable for Bcd binding to the hb promoter. To test this idea, we determined the nH required to pattern the Hb profile of 15 embryos expressing an hb14F allele that is defective in self-activation and found nH to be 3.0 (s.d. 1.0). This result indicates that in WT embryos, the hb self-activation is important for Hb sharpness. Corroborating our results, we also found a progressive increase in the required value of n(H) spanning from 4.0 to 9.2 by determining this coefficient from averaged profiles of eight temporal classes at cycle 14A (T1 to T8). Our results indicate that there is a transition in the mechanisms responsible for the sharp Hb border during cycle 14A: in early stages of this cycle, Bcd cooperative binding is primarily responsible for Hb sharpness; in late cycle 14A, hb self-activation becomes the dominant mechanism.

Evaluating the Drosophila Bicoid morphogen gradient system through dissecting the noise in transcriptional bursts

MOTIVATION

We describe a statistical model to dissect the noise in transcriptional bursts in a developmental system.

RESULTS

We assume that, at any given moment of time, each copy of a native gene inside a cell can exist in either a bursting (active) or non-bursting (inactive) state. The experimentally measured total noise in the transcriptional states of a gene in a population of cells can be mathematically dissected into two contributing components: internal and external. While internal noise quantifies the stochastic nature of transcriptional bursts, external noise is caused by cell-to-cell differences including fluctuations in activator concentration. We use our developed methods to analyze the Drosophila Bicoid (Bcd) morphogen gradient system. For its target gene hunchback (hb), the noise properties can be recapitulated by a simplified gene regulatory model in which Bcd acts as the only input, suggesting that the external noise in hb transcription is primarily derived from fluctuations in the Bcd activator input. However, such a simplified gene regulatory model is insufficient to predict the noise properties of another Bcd target gene, orthodenticle (otd), suggesting that otd transcription is sensitive to additional external fluctuations beyond those in Bcd. Our results show that analysis of the relationship between input and output noise can reveal important insights into how a morphogen gradient system works. Our study also advances the knowledge about transcription at a fundamental level.

CONTACT

jun.ma@cchmc.org

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

Transcriptional activators and activation mechanisms

Transcriptional activators are required to turn on the expression of genes in a eukaryotic cell. Activators bound to the enhancer can facilitate either the recruitment of RNA polymerase II to the promoter or its elongation. This article examines a few selected issues in understanding activator functions and activation mechanisms.

Mathematics and biology: a Kantian view on the history of pattern formation theory

Driesch's statement, made around 1900, that the physics and chemistry of his day were unable to explain self-regulation during embryogenesis was correct and could be extended until the year 1972. The emergence of theories of self-organisation required progress in several areas including chemistry, physics, computing and cybernetics. Two parallel lines of development can be distinguished which both culminated in the early 1970s. Firstly, physicochemical theories of self-organisation arose from theoretical (Lotka 1910-1920) and experimental work (Bray 1920; Belousov 1951) on chemical oscillations. However, this research area gained broader acceptance only after thermodynamics was extended to systems far from equilibrium (1922-1967) and the mechanism of the prime example for a chemical oscillator, the Belousov-Zhabotinski reaction, was deciphered in the early 1970s. Secondly, biological theories of self-organisation were rooted in the intellectual environment of artificial intelligence and cybernetics. Turing wrote his The chemical basis of morphogenesis (1952) after working on the construction of one of the first electronic computers. Likewise, Gierer and Meinhardt's theory of local activation and lateral inhibition (1972) was influenced by ideas from cybernetics. The Gierer-Meinhardt theory provided an explanation for the first time of both spontaneous formation of spatial order and of self-regulation that proved to be extremely successful in elucidating a wide range of patterning processes. With the advent of developmental genetics in the 1980s, detailed molecular and functional data became available for complex developmental processes, allowing a new generation of data-driven theoretical approaches. Three examples of such approaches will be discussed. The successes and limitations of mathematical pattern formation theory throughout its history suggest a picture of the organism, which has structural similarity to views of the organic world held by the philosopher Immanuel Kant at the end of the eighteenth century.

Morphogen gradient formation and action: insights from studying Bicoid protein degradation

In a recent publication, we identified a novel F-box protein, encoded by fates-shifted (fsd), that plays a role in targeting Bcd for ubiquitination and degradation. Our analysis of mutant Drosophila embryos suggests that Bcd protein degradation is important for proper gradient formation and developmental fate specification. Here we describe further experiments that lead to an estimate of Bcd half-life, < 15 min, in embryos during the time of gradient formation. We use our findings to evaluate different models of Bcd gradient formation. With this new estimate, we simulate the Bcd gradient formation process in our own biologically realistic 2-D model. Finally, we discuss the role of Bcd-encoded positional information in controlling the positioning and precision of developmental decisions.

Scaling of the Bicoid morphogen gradient by a volume-dependent production rate

An important feature of development is the formation of patterns that are proportional to the overall size of the embryo. But how such proportionality, or scaling, is achieved mechanistically remains poorly understood. Furthermore, it is currently unclear whether organisms utilize similar or distinct mechanisms to achieve scaling within a species and between species. Here we investigate within-species scaling mechanisms for anterior-posterior (A-P) patterning in Drosophila melanogaster, focusing specifically on the properties of the Bicoid (Bcd) morphogen gradient. Using embryos from lines artificially selected for large and small egg volume, we show that large embryos have higher nuclear Bcd concentrations in the anterior than small embryos. This anterior difference leads to scaling properties of the Bcd gradient profiles: in broad regions of the large and small embryos along the A-P axis, normalizing their positions to embryo length reduces the differences in both the nuclear Bcd concentrations and Bcd-encoded positional information. We further trace the origin of Bcd gradient scaling by showing directly that large embryos have more maternally deposited bcd mRNA than small embryos. Our results suggest a simple model for how within-species Bcd gradient scaling can be achieved. In this model, the Bcd production rate, which is dependent on the total number of bcd mRNA molecules in the anterior, is scaled with embryo volume.