Drosophila cytoplasmic dynein: Mutations, tools, and developmental functions

The study of Drosophila cytoplasmic dynein has leveraged the awesome power of genetics to isolate mutations in dynein subunits and allow the organism to reveal dynein's essential functions. These studies have relied on an extensive background of literature describing Drosophila development, as well as a tool box of sophisticated technologies that have allowed the targeted studies of dynein function in specific cells and tissues. In this review, we summarize many of the available Drosophila mutations and tools that are used to study dynein's function and highlight developmental functions of dynein in germ cells, embryos, and neurons.