Complex craniofacial changes in blind cave-dwelling fish are mediated by genetically symmetric and asymmetric loci.

ABSTRACT: The genetic regulators of regressive craniofacial morphologies are poorly understood. To shed light on this problem, we examined the freshwater fish Astyanax mexicanus, a species with surface-dwelling and multiple independent eyeless cave-dwelling forms. Changes affecting the skull in cavefish include morphological alterations to the intramembranous circumorbital bones encircling the eye. Many of these modifications, however, have evolved separately from eye loss, such as fragmentation of the third suborbital bone. To understand the genetic architecture of these eye-independent craniofacial alterations, we developed and scored 33 phenotypes in the context of an F2 hybrid mapping pedigree bred from Pachón cavefish and surface fish. We discovered several individuals exhibiting dramatic left-

SUBMITTER: Gross JB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3982692 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature