Aix-Marseille Université, CNRS, UMR 7288, Institut de Biologie du Développement de Marseille-Luminy, 13288 Marseille cedex 9, France.
Science. 2013 Mar 22;339(6126):1423-6. doi: 10.1126/science.1233749.
The typical pattern of morphological evolution associated with the radiation of a group of related species is the emergence of a novel trait and its subsequent diversification. Yet the genetic mechanisms associated with these two evolutionary steps are poorly characterized. Here, we show that a spot of dark pigment on fly wings emerged from the assembly of a novel gene regulatory module in which a set of pigmentation genes evolved to respond to a common transcriptional regulator determining their spatial distribution. The primitive wing spot pattern subsequently diversified through changes in the expression pattern of this regulator. These results suggest that the genetic changes underlying the emergence and diversification of wing pigmentation patterns are partitioned within genetic networks.
与一组相关物种的辐射相关的形态进化的典型模式是新特征的出现及其随后的多样化。然而，与这两个进化步骤相关的遗传机制还没有很好地描述。在这里，我们表明，翅膀上的一个暗斑是由一个新的基因调控模块的组装而产生的，在这个模块中，一组色素基因进化到对一个共同的转录调节因子作出反应，从而决定它们的空间分布。原始的翅膀斑点模式随后通过这个调节因子的表达模式的变化而多样化。这些结果表明，翅膀色素模式的出现和多样化的遗传变化是在遗传网络内划分的。
