Development of Eye Colors in Drosophila: Transplantation Experiments on the Interaction of Vermilion with Other Eye Colors.

From these results, it was postulated that two diffusible substances are involved in the development of wild type eye color, that a cinnabar fly is deficient in one of these (cn+ substance), and that a vermilion fly is deficient in both (cn+ and v+ substances). There is evidence for the existence of a third substance necessary for the development of wild type eye color (ca. substance, so named because a genetically claret fly is deficient in this substance), but this substance need not concern us in the present paper. Other known eye colors in Drosophila melanogaster, with the exception of three that are difficult to work with and consequently give doubtful results (bordeaux, bright, and mahogany), show autonomous development in transplants to wild type hosts. For example, a genetically carmine eye disk grown in a wild type host develops an eye color indistinguishable from a carmine control implant obtained by transplanting a carmine eye disk to a carmine host. By growing vermilion and cinnabar eye disks in various eye color mutant hosts, it was found that in most cases the implants develop wild type eye color, indicating that the hosts were able to supply v+ and cn+ substances to the implants. However, vermilion and cinnabar eye disks grown in claret, carnation, carmine, garnet-2, peach, or ruby hosts develop a color