title: Modularity of gene-regulatory networks revealed in sea-star development.
abstract: Evidence that conserved developmental gene-regulatory networks can change as a unit during deutersostome evolution emerges from a study published in BMC Biology. This shows that genes consistently expressed in anterior brain patterning in hemichordates and chordates are expressed in a similar spatial pattern in another deuterostome, an asteroid echinoderm (sea star), but in a completely different developmental context (the animal-vegetal axis). This observation has implications for hypotheses on the type of development present in the deuterostome common ancestor.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Marine Science, School of Biological Sciences, University of Queensland, Brisbane 4072, Australia.
authors.forename: Carmel
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: McDougall
authors.forename: Bernard M
authors.initials: BM
authors.lastname: Degnan
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D047288:Asterina / Q000196:embryology* / Q000235:genetics*; D005075:Biological Evolution; D019521:Body Patterning; D004625:Embryo, Nonmammalian; D053263:Gene Regulatory Networks; D010802:Phylogeny