Journal article
The mid-developmental transition and the evolution of animal body plans
Nature, Vol.531(7596), pp.637-641
31/Mar/2016
PMCID: PMC4817236
PMID: 26886793
Abstract
Animals are grouped into similar to 35 'phyla' based upon the notion of distinct body plans(1-4). Morphological and molecular analyses have revealed that a stage in the middle of development-known as the phylotypic period-is conserved among species within some phyla(5-9). Although these analyses provide evidence for their existence, phyla have also been criticized as lacking an objective definition, and consequently based on arbitrary groupings of animals(10). Here we compare the developmental transcriptomes of ten species, each annotated to a different phylum, with a wide range of life histories and embryonic forms. We find that in all ten species, development comprises the coupling of early and late phases of conserved gene expression. These phases are linked by a divergent 'mid-developmental transition' that uses species-specific suites of signalling pathways and transcription factors. This mid-developmental transition overlaps with the phylotypic period that has been defined previously for three of the ten phyla, suggesting that transcriptional circuits and signalling mechanisms active during this transition are crucial for defining the phyletic body plan and that the mid-developmental transition may be used to define phylotypic periods in other phyla. Placing these observations alongside the reported conservation of mid-development within phyla, we propose that a phylum may be defined as a collection of species whose gene expression at the mid-developmental transition is both highly conserved among them, yet divergent relative to other species.
Details
- Title
- The mid-developmental transition and the evolution of animal body plans
- Creators
- Michal Levin - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyL Anavy (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyAG Cole (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyEitan Winter - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyN Mostov (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyS Khair (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyN Senderovich (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyEkaterina Kovalev (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyDH Silver (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyM Feder (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologySL Fernandez-Valverde (null) - University of QueenslandN Nakanishi (null) - University of QueenslandD Simmons (null) - University of FloridaO Simakov (null) - European Molecular Biology LaboratoryT Larsson (null) - European Molecular Biology LaboratorySY Liu (null) - Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and GeneticsA Jerafi-Vider (null) - 972WIS_INST___120Karina Yaniv (null) - 972WIS_INST___120JF Ryan (null) - University of FloridaMQ Martindale (null) - University of FloridaJC Rink (null) - Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and GeneticsD Arendt (null) - European Molecular Biology LaboratorySM Degnan (null) - University of QueenslandBM Degnan (null) - University of QueenslandT Hashimshony (null) - Technion – Israel Institute of TechnologyI Yanai (Corresponding Author) - Technion – Israel Institute of Technology
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Publication Details
- Nature, Vol.531(7596), pp.637-641; 31/Mar/2016
- Number of pages
- 5
- Language
- English
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1038/nature16994
- PMID
- 26886793
- PMCID
- PMC4817236
- Grant note
- We thank M. Rockman and B. de Bivort for helpful discussions. We also thank U. Gat, A. Salzberg, S. B. Tabou De Leon, M. Blaxter, G. Koutsovoulos, S. Mansour, and B. Goldstein for materials and reagents. We thank the Technion Genome Center for technical assistance and the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies at Harvard University for hosting the analysis phase. This work was supported by a European Research Council grant (EvoDevoPaths), the EMBO Young Investigator Program, and a grant from the Australian Research Council. Author contributions - M.L., T.H., and I.Y. conceived and designed the project. M.L. led the collection of samples with help from N.N., D.S., N.M., S.K. and A.J.-V. The processing of the samples for CEL-Seq was carried out by M.L., T.H., N.M., S.K., and N.S. De novo transcriptome assembly was carried out by L.A. with assistance from I.Y., E.W., J.F.R., and S.-Y.L. Processing of CEL-Seq reads and initial bioinformatics was performed by L.A. with help from M.F., E.W., E.K., D.H.S, O.S., T.L., and S.L.F.-V. The data was analysed by I.Y. and L.A. I.Y. coordinated the interpretation of the data with significant help from B.M.D.; L.A., S.M.D., T.H., A.G.C., D.A., J.F.R., M.Q.M., K.Y., and J.C.R. also contributed to the interpretation of the data. I.Y. wrote the manuscript which the authors commented on.
- Record Identifier
- 993267161103596
Metrics
8 Record Views