Developmental gene regulatory network architecture across 500 million years of echinoderm evolution.

ABSTRACT: Evolutionary change in morphological features must depend on architectural reorganization of developmental gene regulatory networks (GRNs), just as true conservation of morphological features must imply retention of ancestral developmental GRN features. Key elements of the provisional GRN for embryonic endomesoderm development in the sea urchin are here compared with those operating in embryos of a distantly related echinoderm, a starfish. These animals diverged from their common ancestor 520-480 million years ago. Their endomesodermal fate maps are similar, except that sea urchins generate a skeletogenic cell lineage that produces a prominent skeleton lacking entirely in starfish larvae. A relevant set of regulatory genes was isolated from the starfish Asterina miniata, their expression p

SUBMITTER: Hinman VF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC263818 | biostudies-literature | 2003 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature