Posts tagged: EvoDevo

Marking 25 years in metazoan phylogeny- happy birthday Darwin

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EvoDevo

Twenty-five years ago today, on the 12th February 1988, a landmark article was published in Science describing a phylogenetic tree of the metazoans, derived from molecular data. The article, by Katherine Field and colleagues (widely referred to as ‘Field et al.’), represented the first use of small subunit ribosomal RNA to establish the metazoan phylogeny. To mark the anniversary of its publication, and coincidentally Darwin’s 204th birthday, a new commentary is published today in EvoDevo evaluating the impacts of this article.

In this commentary, Max Telford (UCL) critically assesses the techniques and methods used by Field et al., and reconstitutes their dataset, to establish a metazoan phylogeny roughly in line with that accepted today. Despite …

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The difference between a mole and a shrew is in their SOX

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Moles have specialised morphological features, that are highly adapted for their unusual underground lifestyle. One of the most apparent of these features is their specialised forelimbs, which are larger and more robust than their hind limbs. It has been hypothesized that this may be caused by differences in timing (heterochrony) in developmental mechanisms.

In new research published in EvoDevo today, Bickelmann et al. measure the spatial and temporal distribution of SOX9 expression in the Iberian mole Talpa occidentalis. SOX9 is a transcription factor associated with chondrocyte differentiation and the development of the Os falciforme- an extra digit like structure found in both the hands and feet of talpid moles. They compare this with expression …

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