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Record W4410466281 · doi:10.1101/2025.05.13.653887

The transcriptomics of phenotypic nonspecificity in <i>Drosophila melanogaster</i>

2025· preprint· en· W4410466281 on OpenAlexaff
Anthony Percival‐Smith

Bibliographic record

VenuebioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory) · 2025
Typepreprint
Languageen
FieldBiochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
TopicViral Infectious Diseases and Gene Expression in Insects
Canadian institutionsWestern University
Fundersnot available
KeywordsDrosophila melanogasterPhenotypeBiologyGeneticsTranscriptomeEvolutionary biologyGeneGene expression

Abstract

fetched live from OpenAlex

Abstract Transcription factor (TF) function is redundant: TF phenotypes are frequently rescued by TFs not resident to the TF locus, a phenomenon termed phenotypic nonspecificity. Phenotypic nonspecificity in Drosophila melanogaster is not dependent on the DNA binding specificity of the TFs and generally due to genetic complementation. Two TF phenotypes (doublesex [dsx] and apterous [ap]) are rescued by multiple TFs. The rescue by resident TFs, and the rescue and non-rescue by non-resident TFs, of these two phenotypes were used to distinguish between three possible outcomes of the comparison of the TF-dependent mRNA accumulation in these two systems. First, the sets of TF-dependent mRNAs are independent and non-overlapping; second, the sets of TF-dependent mRNAs are independent and overlapping; and third, the sets of TF-dependent mRNAs are constrained and have extensive overlap. The transcriptomes associated with rescue by resident TFs, and rescue and non-rescue by non-resident TFs, of the two TF phenotypes (dsx and ap) provided many examples of extensive overlap indicating regulation of constrained sets of genes. However, the strength of correlation of transcript accumulation observed between the resident and non-resident TFs was not a strong predictor for rescue of the phenotype by the non-resident TFs. The regulation of a constrained set of genes supports the hypothetical assembly of TFs into wolfpacks, and not the hypothetical limited specificity of TF function, as a potential explanation of phenotypic nonspecificity. Article Summary Transcription factors (TF) control the rate that the information stored in DNA is converted to RNA. Although often considered functionally very specific molecules, TF function is redundant, as frequently the process regulated by one TF is also be regulated by another unrelated TF; a genetic phenomenon termed phenotypic nonspecificity. This paper addresses what patterns of gene expression are brought about by TFs that can regulate, or not regulate, the processes of female abdomen pigmentation and initiation of wing formation. Surprisingly, the patterns of gene expression are very similar. Strangely though, the strength of similarity, or correlation, is not a strong predictor that the TF regulates the process.

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.

How this classification was reachedexpand

Full frame machine prediction

Teacher imitation

Not calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.

metaresearch head score (Codex)0.000
metaresearch head score (Gemma)0.000
Version: metacan-v3-hybrid-931329e0061cValidation status: machine_predicted_unvalidated
Candidate categoriesnone
Consensus categoriesnone
DomainCandidate signal: none · Consensus signal: none
Study designCandidate signal: Bench or experimental · Consensus signal: Bench or experimental
GenreCandidate signal: Empirical · Consensus signal: Empirical
Teacher disagreement score0.001
Threshold uncertainty score0.003

Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)

CategoryCodexGemma
Metaresearch0.0000.000
Meta-epidemiology (narrow)0.0000.000
Meta-epidemiology (broad)0.0000.000
Bibliometrics0.0000.000
Science and technology studies0.0000.000
Scholarly communication0.0000.000
Open science0.0000.000
Research integrity0.0000.000
Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)0.0010.000

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.

Opus teacher head0.009
GPT teacher head0.224
Teacher spread0.215 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work
Validation statusscore_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Classification

machine, unvalidated

Machine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.

The models applied no category: nothing in the taxonomy fit this work.
Study designBench or experimental
Domainnot available
GenreEmpirical

How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".

Quick stats

Citations0
Published2025
Admission routes1
Has abstractyes

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