Evidence for active maintenance of phylotranscriptomic hourglass patterns in animal and plant embryogenesis.

ABSTRACT: The developmental hourglass model has been used to describe the morphological transitions of related species throughout embryogenesis. Recently, quantifiable approaches combining transcriptomic and evolutionary information provided novel evidence for the presence of a phylotranscriptomic hourglass pattern across kingdoms. As its biological function is unknown it remains speculative whether this pattern is functional or merely represents a nonfunctional evolutionary relic. The latter would seriously hamper future experimental approaches designed to test hypotheses regarding its function. Here, we address this question by generating transcriptome divergence index (TDI) profiles across embryogenesis of Danio rerio, Drosophila melanogaster, and Arabidopsis thaliana. To enable meaningful evalua

SUBMITTER: Drost HG 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4408408 | biostudies-literature | 2015 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature