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Journal of Neuroscience, Vol 9, 513-527, Copyright © 1989 by Society for Neuroscience

ARTICLE

Peripheral target choice by homologous neurons during embryogenesis of the medicinal leech. I. Segment-specific preferences of Retzius cells

CM Loer and WB Kristan Jr
Department of Biology, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla 92093.

A pair of large serotonergic neurons, the Retzius (Rz) cells, is found in each segment of the leech nervous system. Most Rz cells innervate the body wall of their own segment as well as adjacent anterior and posterior segments. Rz cells in segments 5 and 6 [Rz (5,6)] instead innervate the reproductive tissue found only in those segments. Rz cells from adjacent segments [Rz (4,7)] provide the serotonergic innervation of the body wall of segments 5 and 6. During embryogenesis, the body wall and the reproductive tissue are apparently available to both Rz (5,6) and Rz (4,7), yet these neurons choose different targets. We asked how Rz (5,6) and Rz (4,7) choose their respective peripheral targets in the reproductive segments by ablating either the reproductive tissue or specific Rz cells. Ablation of the reproductive tissue caused Rz (5,6) to innervate body wall, although not as proficiently as did standard Rz cells, suggesting a preference of Rz (5,6) for reproductive tissue. Ablation of those Rz cells that would normally innervate the body wall of segments 5 and 6 did not cause Rz (5,6) to innervate body wall, ruling out competition for this target. When Rz (5,6) were ablated, Rz (4,7) innervated the body wall of segments 5 and 6 normally and did not innervate reproductive tissue. Thus, competition did not act in the choice of target by Rz (4,7) either. These results suggest that during normal development, Rz (5,6) and Rz (4,7) choose their targets independently of one another rather than competing for the available targets and that these cells have segment-specific target preferences.

This article has been cited by other articles:

				W.-B. Gan and E. R. Macagno Competition among the Axonal Projections of an Identified Neuron Contributes to the Retraction of Some of Those Projections J. Neurosci., June 1, 1997; 17(11): 4293 - 4301. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

				C. Loer and W. Kristan Jr Central synaptic inputs to identified leech neurons determined by peripheral targets Science, April 7, 1989; 244(4900): 64 - 66. [Abstract] [PDF]

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