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Drosophila I-R hybrid dysgenesis is associated with catastrophic meiosis and abnormal zygote formation.
J Cell Sci, 123(Pt 20):3515-24.
The Drosophila I-R type of hybrid dysgenesis is a sterility syndrome (SF sterility) associated with the mobilization of the I retrotransposon in female germ cells. SF sterility results from a maternal-effect embryonic lethality whose origin has remained unclear since its discovery about 40 years ago. Here, we show that meiotic divisions in SF oocytes are catastrophic and systematically fail toproduce a functional female pronucleus at fertilization. As a consequence, most embryos from SF females rapidly arrest their development with aneuploid or damaged nuclei, whereas others develop as non-viable, androgenetic haploid embryos. Finally, we show that, in contrast to mutants affecting the biogenesis of piRNAs, SF egg chambers do not accumulate persistent DNA double-strand breaks, suggesting that I-element activity might perturb the functional organization of meiotic chromosomes without triggering an early DNA damage response.
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