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A study from CABD reveals shared genetic patterns among deuterostomes

A publication in the journal 'Nature Ecology and Evolution' generates a collection of data that may contribute to improving our understanding of the evolutionary history of deuterostomes and other animal groups.

The Centro Andaluz de Biología del Desarrollo (CABD), a joint research center of the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC), the Universidad Pablo de Olavide (UPO) and the Junta de Andalucía has studied gene expressions of several species during embryonic development to understand the characteristics common to deuterostomes, the large animal group in which we mammals find ourselves.

Deuterostomes are a group of animals that includes hemichordates, echinoderms and chordates. They share developmental characteristics and are distinguished from another group of animals, the protostomes, where we find worms, mollusks and insects. This study, led by CABD researcher Juan Tena, analyzed for the first time how genes are activated at different stages of development in a species of hemichordate (Ptychodera flava). Comparing gene activations during embryonic development of several species of deuterostomes and protostomes, including for the first time hemichordates, has allowed finding similarities between them and deducing developmental characteristics of their common ancestor, which lived about 800 million years ago.

“In the process of gastrulation, which is when the embryo begins to form its cell layers, we saw that deuterostomes share mechanisms that probably already existed in the common ancestor of bilateral animals, suggesting that these mechanisms are not exclusive to deuterostomes,” explains Juan Tena (CABD). The researchers also discovered that certain genes, called transcription factors, are activated earlier in deuterostomes of the Ambulacraria subgroup (which includes hemichordates and echinoderms) than in chordates and protostomes (other groups of bilaterians). This suggests that some of these developmental mechanisms were rearranged to happen earlier in Ambulacraria.

“Our results show that the ancestry of all deuterostomes and that of bilateral animals were probably more similar than previously thought. These findings align with previous studies and suggest that deuterostomes diversified shortly after bilateral animals appeared. They also support some of the ideas about the origin of vertebrates that our group presented in previous research,” adds researcher Alberto Pérez-Posada, who worked on this project at the CABD and is currently at the University of Exeter, UK.

Understanding these genetic similarities between such different species is of particular importance for understanding how key genes for embryonic development have evolved and how the genetic networks that regulate development have been formed. This work, published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution, also contributes to reconstructing the evolutionary history of animals, improving knowledge about how they arose and diversified.

Pérez-Posada, A., Lin, CY., Fan, TP. et al. Hemichordate cis-regulatory genomics and the gene expression dynamics of deuterostomes. Nat Ecol Evol (2024).

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-024-02562-x


The press release has been written in collaboration with the communication department of CSIC Andalucía Extremadura.