Genetic interactions provide evidence for the role of integrins in specifying normal olfactory behavior in Drosophila melanogaster

In a previous paper, we showed that weak hypomorphic alleles at the myospheroid (mys) locus, which encodes the beta-subunit of integrin, possess defects in olfactory behavior in both adult and larva. In this paper, we show that another olfactory gene, olfE, exhibits haploinsufficient interactions with recessive alleles at the mys locus. olfE has recently been shown to be an allele of swisscheese and is now designated as sws(olfE). Our findings suggest an interaction between the sws protein and beta-integrin in the development and/or functioning of the olfactory system. Similar interactions were also observed between sws and inflated, a gene encoding the alpha2-subunit of integrin, as well as mys and multiple edematous wing (mew), a gene coding for 1 subunit of integrin. This study provides evidence for the roles of different integrin subunits and the sws product in regulating normal olfactory behavior in Drosophila.