Analyzing Frizzled Signaling Using Fixed and Live Imaging of the Asymmetric Cell Division of the Drosophila Sensory Organ Precursor Cell

When you look at the dorsal thorax of a fruitfly, you can easily get fascinated by the high degree of alignment of the bristles that show a strong polarization in their surface organization. This organization of cells in the plane of the epithelium is known as planar cell polarity (PCP), and was initially characterized in Drosophila melanogaster . This process is important in a broad variety of morphological cellular asymmetries in various organisms. In Drosophila , genetic studies of PCP mutants showed that the asymmetric division of the sensory organ precursor cell (pI cell) is polarized along the anterior–posterior axis by Frizzled receptor signaling. Here, we described two methods to image and analyze the PCP in the pI cell model.