Biomedical subjects

R Winklbauer

Publications and source records attributed to R Winklbauer.

23 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

PubMed1986

Cell proliferation in the ectoderm of the Xenopus embryo: development of substratum requirements for cytokinesis.

The requirements for cell division in ectodermal blastomeres of the early Xenopus embryo were studied. Isolated blastomeres divide autonomously on nonadhesive agar in a simple salt solution up to the midblastula stage. After the midblastula transition, cell-cell contact is required for blastomere division. In isolated blastomeres of that stage, cytokinesis fails, but nuclear division continues normally for some time. Cell-cell contact as a prerequisite for blastomere division can be replaced by culturing blastomeres on an appropriate substratum. Clonal growth of isolated blastomeres is supported by a variety of protein substrata, indicating rather unspecific substratum requirements. Different substrata which do not support blastomere division can affect different steps in cytokinesis.

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PubMed1985

Development of the lateral line system in Xenopus laevis. III. Development of the supraorbital system in triploid embryos and larvae.

During normal development of the supraorbital lateral line system of Xenopus, an elongated streak of primordial cells becomes subdivided into a linear series of cell groups containing only about eight cells each, thus forming a row of primary lateral line organs (Winklbauer & Hausen, 1983a,b). In triploid Xenopus embryos, cell size is 1.5 X normal. When the formation of lateral line organs occurs in triploid primordia, the nascent organs contain only about five or six cells each, i.e. about two thirds of normal. Thus, the increase in cell size is compensated for by a corresponding reduction in cell number, keeping constant the organ size in terms of total cell mass or volume. This result excludes a cell counting mechanism for determining organ size. In diploids, the primary organs, although being of equal size initially, differ vastly in their final size and exhibit a peculiar frequency distribution of organ sizes. A detailed quantitative model for supraorbital lateral line development has been proposed, which accounts for this characteristic frequency distribution (Winklbauer & Hausen, 1983b). This model makes precise predictions as to the frequency distribution of the final size of triploid lateral line organs, where the initial organ size is reduced to five or six cells. These predictions were verified experimentally.

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PubMed1985

Development of the lateral line system in Xenopus laevis. IV. Pattern formation in the supraorbital system.

The periodic pattern of the supraorbital lateral line organs forms in the epidermis of Xenopus by the subdivision of a streak-like primordium into a linear series of small cell groups. In normal development, each such organ initially contains about 8 cells (Winklbauer & Hausen, 1983a,b). To see whether this initial organ size depends on the size of the streak-like primordium at the time of organ segregation, primordium size was reduced experimentally before the onset of pattern formation. In such small primordia, the size of the primary organs formed is not adjusted so as to allow the formation of a normal number of organs. Instead, the initial organ size is kept approximately normal, and the number of organs is correspondingly reduced, i.e. the pattern forming mechanism is not capable of 'size regulation'.

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PubMed1983

Development of the lateral line system in Xenopus laevis. I. Normal development and cell movement in the supraorbital system.

During development of Xenopus laevis, the supraorbital lateral line system (i.e. the parietal and supraorbital lines of organs and the anterior auditory group of organs) is all derived from a single primordium located in the ear region of the epidermis. The primordium elongates first by active movement along the dorsal margin of the eye. Individual primary organs are then formed by progressive fragmentation of the streak-like primordium. After fragmentation, passive displacement of the organs due to skin growth seems to play the main role in altering the arrangement of the line system. Transplantation experiments confirmed that non-placodal epidermal cells are not incorporated into the developing system. The active elongation of the primordium is due to cell multiplication, and not due to cell rearrangement or change in cell shape or size. Cell multiplication is not confined to a growth zone, but dividing cells are randomly distributed throughout the primordium. All cells of a primordium have to change position during its elongation.

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PubMed1983

Development of the lateral line system in Xenopus laevis. II. Cell multiplication and organ formation in the supraorbital system.

Cell multiplication was studied during development of the supraorbital lateral line system in Xenopus laevis. The increase in cell number is biphasic. The first phase extends from the beginning of primordial elongation to the end of primary organ formation. Cell number increases linearly during this interval. Throughout this phase, a constant number of cells is in S phase of the cell cycle at a given time, despite a more than 10-fold increase in total cell number. After their formation, the number of the primary organs remains essentially constant. The individual primary organs are not clones of cells. Different organs grow at different rates, and become more and more heterogeneous in size. The second phase which is correlated with accessory organ formation is characterized by an elevated growth rate. This phase was not studied in detail. If developing larvae are starved, growth is normal up to completion of the first growth phase but is arrested at this point. The frequency distribution of the sizes of such growth-arrested organs approximates a binominal distribution. From its characteristics, a detailed model of cell proliferation and organ formation can be deduced: cell multiplication occurs through asymmetrically dividing stem cells, which become allocated to the forming organs at random and go through a fixed number of cell divisions.

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