Dissecting The Role Of The Doublesex Dmd-9 Transcription Factor In C. Elegans
Almost all multicellular organisms have two sexes that exhbit dimorphic molecular and morphological characteristics. Development, including sexually dimorphic development is regulated by transcription factors. In the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans, sexually dimorphic characteristics are regulated by transcription factors from Doublesex DNA Domain family. DMD-9 is a member of this family that shows a restricted expression pattern to a few unidentified sensory neurons. DMD-9 function is unknown. Here, I investigated the endogenous dmd-9 expression in both sexes of C. elegans, hermaphrodite and male, to identify potential sexually dimorphic expression patterns. TO enable this analysis, I used CRISPR-Cas9 to generate an in frame GFP knock-in at the last exon of dmd-9. Additionally, I performed RNA sequencing to identify alterations in the transcriptome in dmd-9 mutant animals. My results show that dmd-9 is expressed in several bilaterally-symmetric left/right pairs of sensory neurons in the head, including BAGL/R, AWBL/R, AWCL/R, and ASEL/R. In addition, I found that as animals become sexually mature, dmd-9 expression is lost in one of the AWCs. In addition, I identified 571 deregulated genes in dmd-9 mutants. My future research aims to dissect the precise functions for DMD-9 in the C. elegans nervous system.