Nature methods published two papers which extend brainbow-like techniques of stochastic multicolored neuronal labeling into fruit flies. Nature’s summary explains the two methods.
- dBrainbow expression examples
The first technique, called dBrainbow, was developed by Julie Simpson, a neuroscientist at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Farm Research Campus in Ashburn, Virginia, and her colleagues2. This method uses enzymes called recombinases to randomly delete some of the colour-producing genes from the string, leaving different genes next to the promoter regions in different cells. Individual cells are therefore uniquely coloured and so can be easily distinguished…
The second technique, called Flybow, was developed by Salecker and her colleagues3. They used an enzyme that ‘flips’ pairs of colour-producing genes on the string, leaving different genes next to the promoter region. The ‘flipping’ enzyme is also a recombinase, and so after being inverted, some of the colour-producing genes are randomly deleted. This ensures that all the different genes on the string can potentially end up next to the promoter, and be displayed by individual modified neurons.. Flybow uses a single string of four colours — red, green, blue and yellow.
These techniques will find use in building the structural and functional connectome of the fly.
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