title: Cis-regulation and conserved non-coding elements in amphioxus.
abstract: The origin of the vertebrates was a major event in the evolution of morphological diversity and the genetic mechanisms responsible for this diversity, once purely theoretical, can now be approached experimentally in the genome era. With a prototypical chordate genome, vertebrate-like development and simple morphology, amphioxus provides the appropriate model for investigating the origin of the vertebrates. Comparative genomics is revealing that both conservation and divergence of genes and cis-regulatory elements involved in developmental regulatory networks are required to shape different animal body plans. This article reviews the cis-regulatory studies performed in amphioxus, the discovery of conserved non-coding elements (CNEs) across the metazoans and the examination of amphioxus CNEs. Emerging ideas on the evolution of CNEs after large-scale genome duplication events and the state of cephalochordate genomics are also discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, Texas A&M University, College Station, 77843-3258, USA. lbeasterjones@bio.tamu.edu
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Beaster-Jones
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D043344:Chordata / Q000235:genetics*; D017124:Conserved Sequence / Q000235:genetics*; D021901:DNA, Intergenic / Q000235:genetics*; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D005786:Gene Expression Regulation; D012045:Regulatory Sequences, Nucleic Acid / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D021901:DNA, Intergenic