An Epidermal Barrier Wound Repair Pathway in <i>Drosophila</i> Is Mediated by <i>grainy head</i>

Abstract

We used wounded Drosophila embryos to define an evolutionarily conserved pathway for repairing the epidermal surface barrier. This pathway includes a wound response enhancer from the Ddc gene that requires grainy head (grh) function and binding sites for the Grh transcription factor. At the signaling level, tyrosine kinase and extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) activities are induced in epidermal cells near wounds, and activated ERK is required for a robust wound response. The conservation of this Grh-dependent pathway suggests that the repair of insect cuticle and mammal skin is controlled by an ancient, shared control system for constructing and healing the animal body surface barrier.