Muscle abbreviations: DSP: dorsal spicule protractor; VSP: ventral spicule protractor; ADP: anal depressor. To obtain the expression pattern of
unc-29 in the C. elegans male, we initially fused to the YFP gene a 2.2 kb sequence, which includes a 1.3 kb of sequence upstream of the
unc-29 start codon and the genomic sequence of the gene up to the second intron (Punc- 29:YFP). This construct is expressed in the anal depressor muscle and the spicule protractor muscles in the male spicule circuit, and it is also expressed in the body wall muscles, some ventral cord neurons and some head neurons. This is consistent with the previous published expression pattern of
unc-38, which encodes an a-subunit that forms the L-AChR with
unc-29 (Liu et al. 2007). Nonetheless, the
unc-29 genomic sequence also contains important information to facilitate transcription of the gene. Therefore, the expression construct that contained the
unc-29 genomic sequence(Punc-29:
unc-29::YFP) provided a broader expression pattern than Punc-29:YFP. (A-D) Expression of Punc-29:YFP (yellow) and Pgar- 3:CFP (cyan) imaged from the tail of a same L4 larval male. The two images are merged to show that
unc-29 is not expressed in the SPC neurons where
gar-3 is expressing (C). The Nomarski image of the tail is also shown (D). Scale bar, 10 um. (E, F) Expression of Punc-29:YFP in the male tail. Scale bar, 20 um.