Analysis of a swallow homologue from Drosophila pseudoobscura

We analyzed a functional homologue of the swallow gene from Drosophila pseudoobscura. The swallow gene of D. melanogaster plays an essential role in localizing bicoid mRNA in oocytes, and swallow mutant embryos show anterior pattern defects that result from the lack of localization of the bicoid morphogen. The pseudoobscura homologue rescues the function of swallow mutants when introduced into the genome of D. melanogaster, and its expression is similar to that of the melanogaster gene. The predicted pseudoobscura and melanogaster proteins are 49% identical and 69% conserved. The coiled-coil domain previously identified in the melanogaster swallow protein is strongly conserved in the pseudoobscura homologue, but the weak similarity of the melanogaster swallow protein to the RNP class of RNA-binding proteins is not conserved in the pseudoobscura homologue. These and other observations suggest a structural role for swallow in localizing bicoid mRNA, perhaps as part of the egg cytoskeleton. Received: 3 August 1999 / Accepted: 29 September 1999