title: A flexible genetic toolkit for arthropod neurogenesis.
abstract: Arthropods show considerable variations in early neurogenesis. This includes the pattern of specification, division and movement of neural precursors and progenitors. In all metazoans with nervous systems, including arthropods, conserved genes regulate neurogenesis, which raises the question of how the various morphological mechanisms have emerged and how the same genetic toolkit might generate different morphological outcomes. Here I address this question by comparing neurogenesis across arthropods and show how variations in the regulation and function of the neural genes might explain this phenomenon and how they might have facilitated the evolution of the diverse morphological mechanisms of neurogenesis.
authors.affiliation: School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road, London E1 4NS, UK a.stollewerk@qmul.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Angelika
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Stollewerk
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001181:Arthropods / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000502:physiology*; D005075:Biological Evolution; D018507:Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental / Q000502:physiology*; D055495:Neurogenesis / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Notch signalling; asymmetric division; neural precursors; neural progenitors; neurogenic potential; patterning genes