Department of Cell Biology, 452 Nanaline Duke, 307 Research Drive, Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina 27710, USA.
Nat Rev Genet. 2017 Nov;18(11):675-689. doi: 10.1038/nrg.2017.60. Epub 2017 Aug 14.
The discovery of the Sry gene in 1990 triggered a revolution in our understanding of sex determination. More recently, advances in non-model organisms have been fuelled by the rapid evolution of affordable genome and transcriptome technologies. This Review considers the unusual plasticity in the bipotential system of sex determination and some of the diverse mechanisms that have evolved to control this critical developmental decision, including strong genetic pathways, environmental influences and epigenetic regulation. Ideas emerging from model and non-model organisms that suggest that sex determination operates as an antagonistic network with the emergent property of bistability are discussed.
1990 年，Sry 基因的发现引发了我们对性别决定理解的一场革命。最近，随着经济实惠的基因组和转录组技术的快速发展，非模式生物的研究也取得了进展。本综述考虑了性别决定双潜能系统的异常可塑性，以及为控制这一关键发育决策而进化出的一些不同机制，包括强有力的遗传途径、环境影响和表观遗传调控。本文还讨论了来自模式生物和非模式生物的一些观点，这些观点表明性别决定作为一个拮抗网络发挥作用，具有双稳态的新兴特性。
