Drosophila melanogaster

Predators[edit]
Drosophila species are prey for many generalist predators, such as robber flies. In Hawaii, the introduction of yellowjackets from mainland United States has led to the decline of many of the larger species. The larvae are preyed on by other fly larvae, staphylinid beetles, and ants.^{[citation needed]}
Neurochemistry[edit]
As with many Eukaryotes, this genus is known to express SNAREs, and as with several others the components of the SNARE complex are known to be somewhat substitutable: Although the loss of SNAP-25 - a component of neuronal SNAREs - is lethal, SNAP-24 can fully replace it. For another example, an R-SNARE not normally found in synapses can substitute for synaptobrevin.^[63]
Immunity[edit]
The Spätzle protein is a ligand of Toll.^[64][65] In addition to melanin's more commonly known roles in the endoskeleton and in neurochemistry, melanization is one step in the immune responses to some pathogens.^[64][65] Dudzic et al 2019 additionally find a large number of shared serine protease messengers between Spätzle/Toll and melanization and a large amount of crosstalk between these pathways.^[64][65]
Systematics[edit]

immigrans-tripunctata radiation  D. quadrilineata species group  Samoaia  Zaprionus  D. tumiditarsus species group  Liodrosophila  Dichaetophora  Hirtodrosophila  Mycodrosophila  Paramycodrosophila  virilis-repleta radiation (in part)  subgenus Siphlodora  virilis-repleta radiation (in part)  Hawaiian Drosophila  Scaptomyza D. polychaeta species group Dorsilopha  Old World Sophophora  New World Sophophora  Lordiphosa  Hirtodrosophila duncani

D. setosimentum, a species of Hawaiian picture-wing fly
The genus Drosophila as currently defined is paraphyletic (see below) and contains 1,450 described species,^[3][66] while the total number of species is estimated at thousands.^[67] The majority of the species are members of two subgenera: Drosophila (about 1,100 species) and Sophophora (including D. (S.) melanogaster; around 330 species).
The Hawaiian species of Drosophila (estimated to be more than 500, with roughly 380 species described) are sometimes recognized as a separate genus or subgenus, Idiomyia,^[3][68] but this is not widely accepted. About 250 species are part of the genus Scaptomyza, which arose from the Hawaiian Drosophila and later recolonized continental areas.
Evidence from phylogenetic studies suggests these genera arose from within the genus Drosophila:^[69][70]

• 
  Liodrosophila Duda, 1922
  
• 
  Mycodrosophila Oldenburg, 1914
  
• 
  Samoaia Malloch, 1934
  
• 
  Scaptomyza Hardy, 1849
  
• 
  Zaprionus Coquillett, 1901
  
• 
  Zygothrica Wiedemann, 1830
  
• 
  Hirtodrosophila Duda, 1923 (position uncertain)
  

Several of the subgeneric and generic names are based on anagrams of Drosophila, including Dorsilopha, Lordiphosa, Siphlodora, Phloridosa, and Psilodorha.
Genetics[edit]
Drosophila species are extensively used as model organisms in genetics (including population genetics), cell biology, biochemistry, and especially developmental biology. Therefore, extensive efforts are made to sequence drosphilid genomes. The genomes of these species have been fully sequenced:^[71]

• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) melanogaster
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) simulans
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) sechellia
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) yakuba
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) erecta
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) ananassae
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) pseudoobscura
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) persimilis
  
• 
  Drosophila (Sophophora) willistoni
  
• 
  Drosophila (Drosophila) mojavensis
  
• 
  Drosophila (Drosophila) virilis
  
• 
  Drosophila (Drosophila) grimshawi
  

The data have been used for many purposes, including evolutionary genome comparisons. D. simulans and D. sechellia are sister species, and provide viable offspring when crossed, while D. melanogaster and D. simulans produce infertile hybrid offspring. The Drosophila genome is often compared with the genomes of more distantly related species such as the honeybee Apis mellifera or the mosquito Anopheles gambiae.
The modEncode consortium is currently sequencing eight more Drosophila genomes,^[72] and even more genomes are being sequenced by the i5K consortium.^[73]
Curated data are available at FlyBase.
The Drosophila 12 Genomes Consortium – led by Andrew G. Clark, Michael Eisen, Douglas Smith, Casey Bergman, Brian Oliver, Therese Ann Markow, Thomas Kaufman, Manolis Kellis, William Gelbart, Venky Iyer, Daniel Pollard, Timothy Sackton, Amanda Larracuente, Nadia Singh, and including Wojciech Makalowski, Mohamed Noor, Temple F. Smith, Craig Venter, Peter Keightley, and Leonid Boguslavsky among its contributors – presents ten new genomes and combines those with previously released genomes for D. melanogaster and D. pseudoobscura to analyse the evolutionary history and common genomic structure of the genus. This includes the discovery of transposable elements and illumination of their evolutionary history.^[74] Bartolomé et al 2009 find at least ¹⁄₃ of the TEs in D. melanogaster, D. simulans and D. yakuba have been acquired by horizontal transfer. They find an average of ^{0.035 HT TEs⁄}_{TE family}⁄_{million years}. Bartolomé also finds HT TEs follow other relatedness metrics, with D. melanogaster⇔D. simulans events being twice as common as either of them ⇔ D. yakuba.