Evidence map›Paper›PMID 24079393›Full record

ArticleEvoDevo2013

Evolution of eye development in the darkness of caves: adaptation, drift, or both?

Sylvie Rétaux, Didier Casane

Open access · goldAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in EvoDevo, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 48 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
48citing papers in PubMed
11.5field-weighted citation impact, top 2% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

48 citing papers in PubMed, 145 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Article
  2. Article
  3. Article
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  5. Parallel sensory compensation following independent subterranean colonization by groundwater salamanders (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  6. Article
  7. Genomic signatures associated with the evolutionary loss of egg yolk in parasitoid wasps.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  8. The emergence and loss of cyclic peptides inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  9. Article
  10. Article
  11. Stabilizing selection in an identified multisensory neuron in blind cavefish.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024
    Article
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  13. Review
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

2 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.

Sylvie RétauxDECA group, Neurobiology & Development Laboratory, CNRS, Gif sur Yvette, France. retaux@inaf.cnrs-gif.fr.
Didier Casane
Génétique Quantitative et Évolution Le Moulon · FRLaboratoire de Neurobiologie Cellulaire et Moléculaire · FR

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Animals inhabiting the darkness of caves are generally blind and de-pigmented, regardless of the phylum they belong to. Survival in this environment is an enormous challenge, the most obvious being to find food and mates without the help of vision, and the loss of eyes in cave animals is often accompanied by an enhancement of other sensory apparatuses. Here we review the recent literature describing developmental biology and molecular evolution studies in order to discuss the evolutionary mechanisms underlying adaptation to life in the dark. We conclude that both genetic drift (neutral hypothesis) and direct and indirect selection (selective hypothesis) occurred together during the loss of eyes in cave animals. We also identify some future directions of research to better understand adaptation to total darkness, for which integrative analyses relying on evo-devo approaches associated with thorough ecological and population genomic studies should shed some light.

Identifiers

PMID24079393
PMCPMC3849642
OpenAlexW2156715846

What OpenQuestion holds

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LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.