Cortical Cyclin A controls spindle orientation during asymmetric cell divisions in Drosophila

Pénélope Darnat (1) , Angélique Burg (1) , Jérémy Sallé (2) , Jérôme Lacoste (1) , Sophie Louvet-Vallée (1) , Michel Gho (1) , Agnès Audibert (1)

1 LBD - Laboratoire de Biologie du Développement [IBPS]
2 IJM (UMR_7592) - Institut Jacques Monod

The coordination between cell proliferation and cell polarity is crucial to orient the asymmetric cell divisions to generate cell diversity in epithelia. In many instances, the Frizzled/ Dishevelled planar cell polarity pathway is involved in mitotic spindle orientation, but how this is spatially and temporally coordinated with cell cycle progression has remained elusive. Using Drosophila sensory organ precursor cells as a model system, we show that Cyclin A, the main Cyclin driving the transition to M-phase of the cell cycle, is recruited to the apicalposterior cortex in prophase by the Frizzled/Dishevelled complex. This cortically localized Cyclin A then regulates the orientation of the division by recruiting Mud, a homologue of NuMA, the well-known spindle-associated protein. The observed non-canonical subcellular localization of Cyclin A reveals this mitotic factor as a direct link between cell proliferation, cell polarity and spindle orientation.

Domaines: Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]

Pénélope Darnat, Angélique Burg, Jérémy Sallé, Jérôme Lacoste, Sophie Louvet-Vallée, et al.. Cortical Cyclin A controls spindle orientation during asymmetric cell divisions in Drosophila. Nature Communications, 2022, 13 (1), pp.2723. ⟨10.1038/s41467-022-30182-1⟩. ⟨hal-03874576⟩