Post-transcriptional gene regulation by the exoribonuclease Pacman

The gene pacman (pcm) in Drosophila melanogaster encodes the exoribonuclease XRN1, which is highly conserved across eukaryotes and is the only known cytoplasmic exoribonuclease that degrades RNA in the 5’ – 3’ direction. Hypomorphic mutations to pacman have previously been shown cause developmental phenotypes, particularly during wing and thorax development. The focus of this thesis was twofold. Firstly, to create a null pacman allele and associated control lines to further characterise the phenotypes of pcm. Two new alleles were created, one of which was amorphic (pcm14). pcm14 is 100% lethal, and flies die during pupation. The wing imaginal discs of pcm14 larvae are less than half the size of those in wild-type larvae at the same stage (3rd instar). It was also found that wing imaginal discs in the hypomorphic mutant pcm5 are significantly smaller than wild-type, by almost 20%. Therefore, pcm appears to play a role in cell proliferation or apoptosis during the growth of wing imaginal discs. Along with pcm14, a new deficiency that includes pcm was created using a DrosDel Rearrangement Screen. The 17,963bp Df(1)ED7452 deficiency is >13 times smaller than the two other publically available deficiencies that include pcm.