Worm Breeder's Gazette 1(1): 12
These abstracts should not be cited in bibliographies. Material contained herein should be treated as personal communication and should be cited as such only with the consent of the author.
In order to study the process of fertilization in C. elegans, we have been characterizing ts sterile mutations similar to the spermatogenesis defective mutants described by Hirsh and Vanderslice. These are isolated as ts sterile hermaphrodites that lay unfertilized oocytes which can be fertilized by wild-type sperm. One such mutant, ts17, was found to have a second ts phenotype. When grown from eggs at 25 C, all 'males' homozygous for ts17 have a normal looking male bursa but have hermaphrodite-like gonads. They are sterile. We call these mutant animals intersexes. The gonads in an intersex resemble hermaphrodite gonads to varying degrees. Commonly, intersex animals have two gonads with several mature oocytes as well as a vulva. From temperature shift experiments, the critical temperature for both phenotypes, hermaphrodite sterility, and intersex is during the first or second larval stage. The mutation is not sex linked. A second ts mutation with the same dual phenotype appears to be allelic to ts17 so mutations in this gene may be common. Other hermaphrodite sterile mutants do not have the second phenotype.