title: Considering the zebrafish in a comparative context.
abstract: This article introduces a special issue on zebrafish biology that attempts to integrate developmental genetics with comparative studies of other fish species. For zebrafish researchers, comparative work offers a better understanding of the evolutionary history of their model system. Comparative biologists can gain many insights from the developmental and genetic mechanisms revealed in zebrafish that have contributed to the huge range of morphological variation among fishes that has arisen over millions of years. These ideas are considered here in various contexts, including systematics, genome organization and the development of the nervous system, pigmentation, craniofacial skeleton and dentition. Studies of the zebrafish in phylogenetic context provide an opportunity for synergy between communities using these two fundamentally different approaches.
authors: Department of Developmental and Cell Biology, University of California, Irvine, California 92697-2300, USA. tschilli@uci.edu
authors: Thomas F
authors: TF
authors: Schilling
authors: Jacqueline
authors: J
authors: Webb
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D015509:Developmental Biology; D004625:Embryo, Nonmammalian / Q000502:physiology; D047108:Embryonic Development; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D005399:Fishes / Q000196:embryology / Q000235:genetics; D016678:Genome; D006801:Humans; D023421:Models, Animal; D010802:Phylogeny; D015027:Zebrafish / Q000196:embryology* / Q000235:genetics*