Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Heads or tails: can Wnt tell which one is up?

Nature Cell Biology volume 10, pages 122–124 (2008)Cite this article

Planarian flatworms regenerate their heads and tails after amputation. It turns out that they use Wnt–β-catenin signalling to determine where the head and the tail should form.

Both studies showed that when β-catenin is knocked down by RNA interference (RNAi) in regenerating trunk fragments, the posterior wound forms a head instead of a tail, whereas the anterior wound regenerates a head as normal, resulting in two-headed animals (Fig. 1b). In addition, whereas animals sliced into left or right halves normally regenerate head, trunk and tail sideways, after knockdown of β-catenin they instead produced multiple sideways facing heads all along the anterior-posterior axis. Thus, β-catenin is required for regeneration of posterior structures and in its absence, all regenerating tissue appears to be of anterior character by default. Consistent with this hypothesis, Gurley et al.2 found that ectopic Wnt signalling triggered by knockdown of APC, an inhibitor of β-catenin, was sufficient to transform the default anterior head structures into more posterior fates and thus caused animals to regenerate a tail instead of a head from an anterior wound, resulting in two-tailed worms (Fig. 1c). In other words, Wnt–β-catenin signalling needs to be switched off for the head to form and switched on for the tail to regenerate.

This is a preview of subscription content

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Figure 1: Wnt–β-catenin signalling regulates head and tail formation during planarian regeneration and vertebrate embryogenesis.

References

  1. Reddien, P. W. & Sanchez Alvarado, A. Annu. Rev. Cell Dev. Biol. 20, 725–757 (2004).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Gurley, K. A., Rink, J. C. & Sanchez Alvarado, A. Science doi: 10.1126/science.1150029 (2007).

  3. Petersen, C. P. & Reddien, P. W. Science doi: 10.1126/science.1149943 (2007).

  4. Tam, P. P., Loebel, D. A. & Tanaka, S. S. Curr. Opin. Genet. Dev. 16, 419–425 (2006).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Schier, A. F. & Talbot, W. S. Annu. Rev. Genet. 39, 561–613 (2005).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  6. Holland, L. Z. Dev. Biol. 241, 209–228 (2002).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Lin, R., Hill, R. J. & Priess, J. R. Cell 92, 229–239 (1998).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  8. Schneider, S. Q. & Bowerman, B. Dev. Cell 13, 73–86 (2007).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Gierer, A. et al. Nature 239, 98–101 (1972).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Broun, M., Gee, L., Reinhardt, B. & Bode, H. R. Development 132, 2907–2916 (2005).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Plickert, G., Jacoby, V., Frank, U., Muller, W. A. & Mokady, O. Dev. Biol. 298, 368–378 (2006).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  12. Wikramanayake, A. H. et al. Nature 426, 446–450 (2003).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  13. Stoick-Cooper, C. L., Moon, R. T. & Weidinger, G. Genes Dev. 21, 1292–1315 (2007).

  14. Clevers, H. Cell 127, 469–480 (2006).

    CAS  Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Affiliations

  1. Elly M. Tanaka is at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics, Pfotenhauerstrasse 108, D-01307 Dresden, Germany and the Center for Regenerative Therapies, Dresden. Gilbert Weidinger is at the Biotechnology Center of the Technical University Dresden, Tatzberg 47, D-01307 Dresden, Germany. tanaka@mpi-cbg.de gilbert.weidinger@biotec.tu-dresden.de

    Elly M. Tanaka & Gilbert Weidinger

Authors
  1. Elly M. Tanaka
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Gilbert Weidinger
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Tanaka, E., Weidinger, G. Heads or tails: can Wnt tell which one is up?. Nat Cell Biol 10, 122–124 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1038/ncb0208-122

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ncb0208-122

Further reading

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing