Characterising the Effect of Wnt/β-Catenin Signalling on Melanocyte Development and Patterning: Insights from Zebrafish ()

Overview

Journal Int J Mol Sci

Publisher MDPI

Specialties Biochemistry
Chemistry
Molecular Biology

Date 2023 Jul 14

PMID 37445870

Authors

Praneeth Silva

Devi Atukorallaya

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Zebrafish () is a well-established model organism for studying melanocyte biology due to its remarkable similarity to humans. The Wnt signalling pathway is a conserved signal transduction pathway that plays a crucial role in embryonic development and regulates many aspects of the melanocyte lineage. Our study was designed to investigate the effect of Wnt signalling activity on zebrafish melanocyte development and patterning. Stereo-microscopic examinations were used to screen for changes in melanocyte count, specific phenotypic differences, and distribution in zebrafish, while microscopic software tools were used to analyse the differences in pigment dispersion of melanocytes exposed to LiCl (Wnt enhancer) and W-C59 (Wnt inhibitor). Samples exposed to W-C59 showed low melanocyte densities and defects in melanocyte phenotype and patterning, whereas LiCl exposure demonstrated a stimulatory effect on most aspects of melanocyte development. Our study demonstrates the crucial role of Wnt signalling in melanocyte lineage and emphasises the importance of a balanced Wnt signalling level for proper melanocyte development and patterning.

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PMID: 39219677 PMC: 11358575. DOI: 10.1007/s42995-024-00221-5.

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