Research Perspective Volume 3, Issue 9 pp 896—905

Figure 3. Environment and developmental timing to-gether specify the physiological strategy cells use to maintain protein homeostasis. The left hand column indicates different environmental conditions that nematodes encounter, ranging from well fed (i.e., abundant nutrients), to acute or sparse nutrient availability, to more severe and chronic dietary restriction. The right hand columns show the resulting predominant physiological state that occurs depending on the stage in development (i.e., larvae versus adulthood) at which the animal encounters the indicated environmental conditions. We hypothesize that signaling pathways like the EGF pathway and IIS pathway respond to environmental conditions and to developmental timing so as to coordinate the appropriate physiological response.