Infarinato N (2019) J Cell Biol "Xiaochen Wang: Building up our understanding of breaking down."

Infarinato N

[J Cell Biol, 2019]

Wang studies lysosomal degradation pathways using <i>C. elegans</i> as a model system.

Wang JT et al. (2014) Curr Biol "P granules."

Seydoux G, Wang JT

[Curr Biol, 2014]

Wang and Seydoux discuss the functional importance of P granules - the germline-specific RNA granules of C. elegans.

Munro E (2017) Dev Cell "Protein Clustering Shapes Polarity Protein Gradients."

Munro E

[Dev Cell, 2017]

In this issue of Developmental Cell, Dickinson etal. (2017) and Rodriguez etal. (2017), along with Wang etal. (2017) in Nature Cell Biology, show how PAR protein oligomerization can dynamically couple protein diffusion and transport by cortical flow to control kinase activity gradients and polarity in the C.elegans zygote.

Rashid S et al. (2017) Dev Cell "Packing on the Pounds in Response to Bacterial Growth Conditions."

Rashid S, MacNeil LT

[Dev Cell, 2017]

Reporting in Nature Cell Biology, Lin and Wang (2017) show that bacterial methyl metabolism impacts host mitochondrial dynamics and lipid storage in C.elegans. The authors propose a model whereby bacterial metabolic products regulate a nuclear hormone receptor that promotes lipid accumulation through expression of a secreted Hedgehog-like protein.

Vincenz L et al. (2014) Cell "Sugarcoating ER Stress."

Vincenz L, Hartl FU

[Cell, 2014]

The hexosamine biosynthetic pathway (HBP) generates metabolites for protein N- and O-glycosylation. Wang et al. and Denzel et al. report a hitherto unknown link between the HBP and stress in the endoplasmic reticulum. These studies establish the HBP as a critical component of the cellular machinery of protein homeostasis.

Sural S (2023) Trends Genet "Protecting axons in grandchildren."

Sural S

[Trends Genet, 2023]

Prenatal exposure to environmental agents can influence the fitness of not only the fetus, but also subsequent generations. In a recent study, Wang et al. demonstrated that feeding ursolic acid (UA), a plant-derived compound, to Caenorhabditis elegans mothers during their reproductive period prevented neurodegeneration in not only their offspring, but also the F2 progeny.

Spalthoff C et al. (2016) Neuron "Sensing pH with TMCs."

Gopfert MC, Spalthoff C

[Neuron, 2016]

Transmembrane channel-like (TMC) proteins have been implicated in hair cell mechanotransduction, Drosophila proprioception, and sodium sensing in the nematode C.elegans. In this issue of Neuron, Wang etal. (2016) report that C.elegans TMC-1 mediates nociceptor responses to high pH, not sodium, allowing the nematode to avoid strongly alkaline environments in which most animals cannot survive.

Matsumoto M et al. (2005) Cell Metab "All roads lead to FoxO."

Accili D, Matsumoto M

[Cell Metab, 2005]

Stress-activated kinases control metabolism by antagonizing the early steps of insulin signal transduction. Two papers now demonstrate that Jnk, the prototypical stress-activated kinase, controls life span in Drosophila and C. elegans by promoting phosphorylation of the forkhead protein FoxO (Oh et al., 2005; Wang et al., 2005). The findings provide yet another mechanism by which metabolic and stress responses are integrated via phosphorylation of FoxO proteins.

Joseph Watson et al. (2006) Neuronal Development, Synaptic Function, and Behavior Meeting "Toward gene expression profiling of rare C. elegans cells"

Joe Don Heath, David Miller, Damian Marlee, Joseph Watson, Stephen Von Stetina, Shenglong Wang

[Neuronal Development, Synaptic Function, and Behavior Meeting, 2006]

With its sequenced genome and simple, well-defined nervous system, C. elegans is ideally suited for generating a high-resolution gene expression map of the nervous system. However, the limited amounts of mRNA that can be easily obtained from rare cell types is a barrier to the realization of this goal. WT-OvationTM, a new, more efficient method for amplifying mRNA should faciliate this effort. To test this approach, the mRNA tagging strategy was used to profile gene expression in all neurons. A T7 RNA polymerase dependent method (IVT) required at least 25ng of template mRNA whereas robust microarray profiles were obtained from 2ng of starting mRNA amplified with WT-Ovation. Enriched genes from both methods showed marked neuronal expression (~90%) and together identify ~1100 common transcripts. Interestingly, each method also identified unique transcripts not detected by the alternative strategy. To test the applicability of this approach to a single cell, we have selected the excretory cell, one of the largest cells in C. elegans. The excretory cell uses neuronal guidance cues and receptors to elaborate an H-shaped network of tubes with essential osmoregulatory functions. The clh-4 promoter was used to drive exclusive expression of 3XFLAG-PAB-1 in the excretory cell. WT-OvationTM amplification of mRNA (2ng) immunoprecipiated from this line detects known excretory cell genes on the Affymetrix microarray. For example, ceh-6, a homeodomain protein that specifies excretory cell differentiation is enriched whereas transcription factors that regulate neuronal development (e.g. unc-86) are not elevated in the excretory cell microarray data. The preponderance of genes encoding ion channels and transporters (~20%) is consistent with the osmoregulatory function of the excretory cell. We conclude that WT-OvationTM affords a reliable mRNA amplification method that should faciliate ongoing efforts in our lab to profile gene expression in single types of C. elegans neurons.

Li T et al. (2022) STAR Protoc "Live imaging of postembryonic developmental processes in C.elegans."

Wang X, Zou Y, Li T, Feng Z

[STAR Protoc, 2022]

Live imaging is an important tool to track dynamic processes such as neuronal patterning events. Here, we describe a protocol for time-lapse microscopy analysis using neuronal migration and dendritic growth as examples. This protocol can provide detailed information for understanding cellular dynamics during postembryonic development in Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans). For complete details on the use and execution of this protocol, please refer to Feng etal. (2020), Li etal. (2021), and Wang etal. (2021).