The role of Dystrophin, Cap n' collar and Crossveinless 2 in the patterning of the crossveins of Drosophila melanogaster

The formation of the crossveins during the development of the wing of Drosophila melanogaster involves a surprisingly large diversity of signal transduction pathways given that it is such a minor patterning detail. This makes the posterior crossvein (pcv) a valuable tool to help elucidate the functions of the factors that are necessary for its proper formation. In this dissertation, I examine three such factors: Dystrophin, Cap n' collar and Crossveinless 2.;We find that the Drosophila Dystroglycan complex (DGC) is acting as a scaffold to basal-laterally localize the function of Rho family GEFs and GAPs. Genetic manipulations that cause the loss of the DGC cause defects in the pcv. It has also been implicated in modulating cell signaling pathways. We find that the DGC core protein, Dystrophin, is an antagonist to Dcdc42 activity and likely due to an inhibitory effect on a GEF called GEFmeso. We also demonstrate that cells that are mutant for dystrophin show a decrease in Rho1 activity. In addition, we determined that the subcellular localization and function of the GAP, Crossveinless C is dependant on the presence of Dystrophin.;The role of cap n' collar (cnc) in the pattern formation of the veins was investigated. In addition we describe the results of a yeast-two hybrid screen using Crossveinless 2 as bait.