Advances in Evolutionary Developmental Biology E-Book

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 538

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

Providing outstanding breadth of coverage inevo-devo, Advances in Evolutionary DevelopmentalBiology provides a comprehensive review of the milestonesof research in evolution and development and outlines the excitingresearch agenda for the field going forward. Compiling theviewpoints of a diverse group of field experts, this timely textexpands the now-mature science of evo-devo into more complex areasof research. This essential reference is destined to become thego-to source for ideas and hypotheses for a new generation ofgraduate students in evolutionary and developmental biology.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Title page

Copyright page

Preface

Contributors

1: “The Genetic Tool-Kit”: The Life-History of an Important Metaphor

Introduction

Historical Background to the Term

From “Homeotic Genes” (and “Homeoboxes”) to the General Idea of Key Regulatory Genes with Conserved Developmental Functions

The Genetic Tool-Kit: The Seminal Findings That Led to its Coinage and the Key Idea

The Genetic Tool-Kit as a Non-Answer to the Question of Evolutionary Diversification within the Animal Kingdom

Thinking about How GRNs Are “Rewired”: Two Approaches

Conclusions

Acknowledgments

2: The Evolution of Sex Determination in Animals

Introduction

Evo-Devo of Sex Determination

The Origin of Network Novelty

Evolution of Genotypic Sex Determination

Evolution of Environment-Dependent Sex Determination

From ESD to GSD and Back Again

Acknowledgments

3: The Evolution and Development of Eusocial Insect Behavior

The Path from Solitary Life to Advanced Social Living

What Could Natural Selection Act Upon to Build Eusocial Insect Societies?

Epigenetics: A New Understanding of the Regulation of Social Life

Social Insect Evolution: A Quickly Advancing Field

4: Evo-Devo on Chip

Introduction

Interrogating Developmental Mechanisms in Drosophila melanogaster Using Microdevices

Microfluidic Advances for Developmental and Behavioral Studies in C. elegans

Microfluidic Culture Systems for Studying Genetic and Environmental Effects on D.rerio Development

Mammalian Embryonic Development in Microsystems

Conclusion

5: From Black and White to Shades of Gray: Unifying Evo-Devo through the Integration of Molecular and Quantitative Approaches

Introduction

The Geometry of Development: A Quantitative Approach

The Broad Applicability of Shades of Gray: Using GM to Connect Micro- and Macro-Level Patterns of Divergence

Ontogenetic Theories of Phenotypic Divergence

Testing the Role of Ontogeny in Microevolution

Conclusions

Acknowledgments

6: Advances in Understanding Limb Regeneration in a Developmental and Evolutionary Context

Introduction

Regeneration or Redevelopment?

The Origin of the Regenerate: Are Blastema Cells Pluripotent or Lineage-Restricted?

Is Regeneration the True Ancestral State?

Final Thoughts

7: Ectodermal Organ Stem Cells: Morphogenesis, Population Regenerative Behavior, and Evo-Devo

Physiological Regeneration of Ectodermal Organ Stem Cells

Feather Regeneration: Stem Cell Homeostasis and Morphogenesis

Evolution of Feathers

Hair Regeneration: Population Behavior in Regeneration

Regenerative Hair Waves in Transgenic Mice and Different Mammalian Species

Acknowledgments

8: Perspectives in Evo-Devo of the Vertebrate Brain

Introduction

Emergence of the Vertebrate Forebrain in Early Chordates and Its Diversification

Developmental Control of the Evolution of Brain Size and Relative Brain Region Size

Evolution of cis-Regulation of Brain Developmental Genes

Conclusion

9: Evolution and Development of Language

Background

Genes and Pathways

Life History

Disorders of Language

Future Directions

Acknowledgments

10: Advancing Evolutionary Developmental Biology

Introduction

From Snapshots to Moving Pictures

Very Early and Very Late

The Missing Pieces

Summary: Advancing Evolutionary Development

Acknowledgments

Index

Cover Design: Wiley

Cover Image: Courtesy of the author

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Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Advances in evolutionary developmental biology / edited by: J. Todd Streelman.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-118-13111-4 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Developmental biology. 2. Evolution (Biology) I. Streelman, J. Todd (Jeffrey Todd).

QH491.A24 2013

571.8–dc23

2013038051

Preface

My thoughts to work on this project began some time ago, while discussing biology at Morningside Elementary School in Atlanta. I asked a group of students to show me, using their hands, how small they were at their smallest point in life. Every child indicated that they were the smallest at birth; most had pictures at home of this day. They had no idea, perhaps couldn't even conceive, that they'd been growing and developing for months prior to being born. So I thought to organize a book around basic, fundamental processes in biology where the truth is almost too remarkable to believe: How do brains develop and evolve? How are boys and girls made differently? How does social information influence development? How do creatures regenerate body parts? How did human language evolve?

The idea for me is that most scientists are just as creative and full of wonder as are second graders, and that the most captivating questions then remain so now. My particular prism, through which to view these questions, is the discipline of evolutionary developmental biology because evo-devo links proximal data to ultimate explanation, via mechanism.

This book is organized into chapters that pass the second-grade litmus test—each addresses fundamental biological mysteries that open the eyes of the child in us all. I thank the authors who have written and illustrated with such care and beauty; my students and postdocs who provided encouragement and comment on this endeavor throughout; and of course those friends and colleagues who reviewed and improved chapter content.

J. Todd Streelman

Contributors

R. Craig Albertson, Department of Biology, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA

Gro V. Amdam, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, and Department of Chemistry, Biotechnology and Food Science, University of Life Sciences, Aas, Norway

Franck Bourrat, Institut Alfred Fessard, CNRS, Gif sur Yvette, France

Cheng-Ming Chuong, Department of Pathology, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

Adam G. Dolezal, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ

Kevin B. Flores, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ

Hélène Hinaux, Institut Alfred Fessard, CNRS, Gif sur Yvette, France

Jean-Stéphane Joly, Institut Alfred Fessard, CNRS, Gif sur Yvette, France

Genevieve Konopka, Department of Neuroscience, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX

Jessica A. Lehoczky, Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA

Ang Li, Department of Pathology, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

Hang Lu, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA

Judith E. Mank, Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, University College London, London, UK

Daniel J. Miller, Department of Neuroscience, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, TX

Kevin J. Parsons, Institute of Biodiversity, Animal Health and Comparative Medicine, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK

Sylvie Rétaux, Institut Alfred Fessard, CNRS, Gif sur Yvette, France

J. Todd Streelman, School of Biology, and Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA

Clifford J. Tabin, Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA

Kirsten S. Traynor, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ

Tobias Uller, Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

Randall Widelitz, Department of Pathology, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

Adam S. Wilkins, Institute of Theoretical Biology, Humboldt University of Berlin, Berlin, Germany

Ping Wu, Department of Pathology, Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA

Jun Yin, College of Life Science, Inner Mongolia Agricultural University, Huhhot, China

Mei Zhan, School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, and Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA

1

“The Genetic Tool-Kit”: The Life-History of an Important Metaphor

Adam S. Wilkins

Institute of Theoretical Biology, Humboldt University of Berlin, Berlin, Germany

Introduction

The expression “the genetic tool-kit” denotes a central idea in evolutionary developmental biology: that there is a relatively small set of key regulatory genes for conserved developmental patterning functions—for tissues, organs, and body axial patterning—throughout the diverse phyla of bilaterally symmetrical animals, despite the tremen­dous morphological and developmental differences among those phyla. These genes comprise the basic “tools,” denoted by the term, that are essential for the developmental construction of these animals. This chapter will attempt to describe the historical background, genesis, significance—and limitations—of the term. Yet, before launching into the topic itself, it might be helpful to begin with a look at how new terms, in general, first promote and enlarge understanding and then, with time, often come to constrain it.

We understand things only in relationship to other things, whether objects or ideas. Though preverbal infants undoubtedly have some mental capacity for making comparisons, language is essential for making clear such conceptual linkages. The two essential linguistic forms for doing so are similes (“X is like Y”) and metaphors (“X is a Y”). Both are indispensable instruments (itself a metaphor) for making sense of the world but, in general, metaphors are more powerful, hence more effective than similes. Every simile raises an implicit question about the degree of resemblance (“How much is X really like Y?”), hence raising a doubt about its aptness while, in contrast, metaphors stress the essential identity between the term of the metaphor and the object/process to which it refers. A good metaphor captures something fundamental and thereby sharpens understanding. This is as true of metaphors used in science as those employed in ordinary speech. Within evolutionary biology, in particular, metaphors have been a particularly important aid in understanding. Indeed, the field was built upon a metaphor, one coined by Charles Darwin, that of “natural selection.” Though it was based on a simile to artificial (human-directed) selection as practiced by the plant and animal breeders, it is a metaphor. Evolutionary biology is, in fact, rife with metaphors. Some examples are “evolutionary tinkering,” “the selfish gene,” “the adaptive landscape,” “phylogenetic trees,” “genetic drift,” “inbreeding depression,” “hybrid vigor,” “life history studies,” “developmental plasticity,” “canalization,” “evolutionary entropy.”

Within evolutionary developmental biology specifically, there has been no metaphor more important than the genetic tool-kit. It captures the essence of the phenomenon that launched the contemporary field. It was based on the discovery that there is a rather limited set of regulator genes that play conserved functional roles in organizing the “body plans” (another metaphor) of the bilaterian animal phyla (the bilaterally symmetric animals which comprise the great majority of animal species). Though coined relatively late, with respect to the findings it sums up, the term crystallized understanding of the phenomenon it denotes.

In the first part of this article, the history and importance of this concept, and the origins of its designating term, will be set out. I will then discuss why a continued focus on the concept and use of the term may retard the further maturation of evolutionary developmental biology. Such a history of rise-and-fall of the usefulness of an expression is not atypical for metaphors in science. At first, they can be invaluable aids to understanding but, with repeated use, they inevitably lose their freshness and as new findings appear, they begin to seem less apt. The long-standing characterization of clichés, that “a cliché is a dead metaphor,” sums up this trajectory.

Historical Background to the Term

Though the expression “the genetic tool-kit” did not achieve currency until the late 1990s, it had a century-old antecedent in a prior idea. This is the concept that, in animal development and evolution, “some genes are more important than others.” That was, in essence, if not in those words (the word “gene” had not yet been coined), the key implication of a classic work, published in 1894, titled Materials for the Study of Variation, Treated with Especial Regard to the Discontinuity in the Origin of Species. The author was William Bateson (), who would later give the science of genetics its name and who was one of its foremost practitioners in the first decades of the 20th century. The thesis of Bateson's book was that it is hereditary variations of major observable phenotypic effect that are the source material for evolutionary change (Bateson 1894). It was thus a direct challenge to Darwin's belief that all evolution proceeds via the accumulation of variations of small effect, as the subtitle itself rather aggressively suggests. As pointed out by Gould (1992), Darwin's view had been, in a sense, a democratic one: it implicitly assigned equal potential importance to genes affecting morphology in the evolution of traits and to all mutations that create changes of small phenotypic effect in those genes. Bateson intended to refute that idea by placing known mutations of major phenotypic effect at the center of evolutionary thought.