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Collective Behavior Of Drosophila Melanogaster Neural Progenitor And Imaginal Disc Cells Within Controlled Microenvironments, Caroline D. Pena

Dissertations and Theses

Regenerative therapies for the damaged visual system have introduced stem-derived cells to recapitulate developmental processes and initiate functional regeneration in different components of the eye. The developing visual system in Drosophila Melanogaster offers a model in which to analyze the associated processes in retinogenesis. The optic nerve is critical to vision and is developmentally preceded in Drosophila by a structure called the Optic Stalk (OS). Collective migration of neural and retinal progenitor cells (RPCs) from the developing brain lobes (DBL) to the Imaginal Disc (ID), through the OS, is a fundamental part of regenerative strategies in retina. Developmental signals governing …