Chance caught on the wing: cis-regulatory evolution and the origin of pigment patterns in Drosophila

Nicolas Gompel, Benjamin Prud'homme, Patricia J. Wittkopp, Victoria A. Kassner and Sean B. Carroll ()
Additional contact information
Nicolas Gompel: University of Wisconsin
Benjamin Prud'homme: University of Wisconsin
Patricia J. Wittkopp: University of Wisconsin
Victoria A. Kassner: University of Wisconsin
Sean B. Carroll: University of Wisconsin

Nature, 2005, vol. 433, issue 7025, 481-487

Abstract: Abstract The gain, loss or modification of morphological traits is generally associated with changes in gene regulation during development. However, the molecular bases underlying these evolutionary changes have remained elusive. Here we identify one of the molecular mechanisms that contributes to the evolutionary gain of a male-specific wing pigmentation spot in Drosophila biarmipes, a species closely related to Drosophila melanogaster. We show that the evolution of this spot involved modifications of an ancestral cis-regulatory element of the yellow pigmentation gene. This element has gained multiple binding sites for transcription factors that are deeply conserved components of the regulatory landscape controlling wing development, including the selector protein Engrailed. The evolutionary stability of components of regulatory landscapes, which can be co-opted by chance mutations in cis-regulatory elements, might explain the repeated evolution of similar morphological patterns, such as wing pigmentation patterns in flies.

Date: 2005
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature03235 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:433:y:2005:i:7025:d:10.1038_nature03235

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/nature03235

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().