Mohler, William, Shroff, Hari, Kumar, Abhishek, Katzman, Braden, Nguyen, Nhan, Barnes, Kris, Sengupta, Titas, Bao, Zhirong, Christensen, Ryan, Duncan, Leighton, Santella, Anthony, Duncan, William, Bosque, Gabriela, Moyle, Mark, Fan, Li, Shah, Pavak, Harvey, Brandon, Ikegami, Richard, Colon-Ramos, Daniel, Tang, Doris
[
International Worm Meeting,
2017]
WormGUIDES is an interactive 4D atlas of C. elegans embryogenesis. Its goals are to (1) provide a model of neural development based on detailed time lapse measurements of nuclear positions and neurite outgrowth; (2) cross reference worm community data with the 4D model and (3) provide an easy to use visualization platform for exploring, understanding and annotating the model and sharing insights. The major tracts of the adult nervous system are laid out early and added to over time. By the 1.5 fold stage many major structures are established. The nerve ring (NR) forms a complete loop that includes dorsal and ventral cells. Sensory nerves have extended to the dent, and the amphid commissure is established. Motor neurons in the VNC have intercalated and others have extended into the VNC and toward the NR. The early emergence of tracts motivates a hierarchal approach to modeling and measuring neural development. Our model contains three levels of structure: (1) Tracts, major nerve tracts; (2) Multi-cellular structures, small groups of co-labeled neurons; and (3) Individual cells. The latter two include cell bodies as well as fascicules or individual neurites. Neurites are threaded through the tracts based on measured lengths and tip positions to minimize noise in alignment and maximize legibility. The current model contains 9 tracts representing the amphid sensory nerves, amphid commissures, NR, VNC and connections, 21 neurons (5 single cell) and nuclear positions up to twitching. We have mapped 6 groups of neurites in the NR with stereotypical positions involving 30 neurons, and sorted the 38 ventral-going amphid commissure axons into 4 temporal groups. 182 markers slated for analysis cover almost all neurons. Stochastic labeling by heat shock, mosaicism of reporter arrays and single cell photo conversion are being pursued to distinguish intertwined neurons. Additional imaging and analysis tools are being developed to push our model to hatching. The wormguides.org website provides comprehensive information on the project, access to our reagents and image data, and a download of the latest atlas. We accept nomination of markers and cells as priorities, and promote sharing of user-driven annotations of developmental processes.