Journal
JOURNAL OF INSECT PHYSIOLOGY
Volume 48, Issue 2, Pages 231-237Publisher
PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
DOI: 10.1016/S0022-1910(01)00168-8
Keywords
temperature; body size; cell size; growth; Drosophila
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Funding
- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council [SF19106] Funding Source: researchfish
- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council [SF19106] Funding Source: Medline
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Most ectotherms show increased body size at maturity when reared under colder temperatures. In principle. temperature could produce this outcome by influencing growth, proliferation and/or death of epidermal cells. Here we investigated the effects of rearing temperature on the cell size and cell number in the wing blade, the basitarsus of the leg and the cornea of the eye of Drosophila melanogaster from two populations at opposite ends of a South American latitudinal cline. We found that, in both strains of D. melanogaster and in both sexes, a decrease in rearing temperature increases the size of the wings, legs and eyes through an effect on epidermal cell size, with no significant change in cell number. Our results indicate that temperature has a consistent effect on cell size in the Drosophila epidermis and this may also apply to other cell types. In contrast, the evolutionary effects of temperature on the different organs are not consistent. We discuss our findings in the context of growth control in Drosophila. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
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