Prospero prevents lineage-specific loss and gain by regulating cyclin E and mitosis during Drosophila neurogenesis.

Loss of Prospero in Drosophila neuroblasts causes misregulation of cyclin E and mitosis, leading to defective neurogenesis without dedifferentiation or stem cell formation.

• Why it matters: Understanding Prospero's role is crucial because its dysfunction was thought to cause neuroblast dedifferentiation, but its actual function in lineage regulation remains unclear, impacting insights into neural development.
• What they did: The study used loss-of-function mutants to analyze CNS cells, revealing misexpression of lineage genes, axon projection defects, and cell cycle arrest associated with cyclin E misregulation and chromatin-binding activity.
• The result: Findings demonstrate that Prospero prevents lineage-specific gene misregulation and mitotic errors, enabling proper neurogenesis, and suggest its role in gene regulation and cell cycle control is vital for neural development.