Aging-related upregulation of the homeobox gene caudal represses intestinal stem cell differentiation in Drosophila

This study investigated Drosophila midguts and found an obvious upregulation of caudal (cad), which encodes a homeobox transcription factor that is traditionally known as a central regulator of embryonic anterior-posterior body axis patterning, in intestinal stem/progenitor cells upon aging.To investigate the mechanism with which caudal regulates the differentiation of EBs in Drosophila melanogaster, RNA-seq was performed on dissected midguts with cad depleted in esg+ cells (esgts> cad RNAi) and control (esgts> WT) midguts carrying just esgts-Gal4.A number of genes that have been reported to regulate intestinal stem or progenitor cell differentiation in Drosophila were significantly upregulated in midguts with cad depleted in esg+ cells.