RNAi dissects signal pathway
First use of high-throughput RNAi screening in a lab setting reveals novel
components
By Cathy Holding

In the first published real use of high-throughput RNAi screening in a
laboratory setting, a group of researchers at the University of California,
San Francisco, has identified novel negative and positive regulators of a
Drosophila melanogaster signal transduction pathway.

Edan Foley and Patrick O'Farrell report their study of Drosophila's innate
immune defense system in the June 22 PLoS Biology. To dissect the pathway,
the team created a library of 7216 double-stranded Drosophila RNAs that
interfered with most of the phylogenetically conserved genes.

The authors identified numerous components of signal transduction, including
negative and positive regulators of innate immune signaling, a hierarchy of
gene action, and a novel gene, sickie-required for activation of a key
component of the pathway, Relish.

"These double-stranded RNA messages are really powerful-and particularly
powerful and easy to use in Drosophila," O'Farrell said. "We can make any
double-stranded RNA, pretty much, and we just pipette it on top of the cells
and it inactivates the genes." He added that a graduate student might spend
5 or 6 years identifying one gene, isolating it and studying it, "and we
have in several cases conducted entire screens in less than a month."

Read the rest at The Scientist.com
http://www.biomedcentral.com/news/20040623/01

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