ArticleNature ecology & evolution2022
Evolution of stickleback spines through independent cis-regulatory changes at HOXDB.
Article in Nature ecology & evolution, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 17 papers.
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Who cites it
17 citing papers in PubMed, 26 citations in OpenAlex.
- A near telomere-to-telomere genome assembly of the Amur stickleback (Zoological research · 2026Article
- Rapid and repeated evolution of myosin copy number in threespine stickleback.Current biology : CB · 2026Article
- Insights into cephalochordate genome and gene evolution from the early-diverging amphioxusProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Testing vivo-morpholino mediated gene knockdown in threespine stickleback.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Rapid and repeated evolution of myosin copy number in threespine stickleback.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Genome sequence of a marine threespine stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus) from Rabbit Slough in the Cook Inlet.G3 (Bethesda, Md.) · 2025Article
- Bilateral asymmetry in craniofacial structures and kinematics of feeding attacks in the scale-eating cichlid fish,Zoological research · 2025Article
- Article
- Heterochrony in orthodenticle expression is associated with ommatidial size variation between Drosophila species.BMC biology · 2025Article
- Genetic mechanisms of axial patterning inEvolution letters · 2024Article
- Genome-wide analysis of histone modifications can contribute to the identification of candidate cis-regulatory regions in the threespine stickleback fish.BMC genomics · 2024Article
- Inferring the evolution of reproductive isolation in a lineage of fossil threespine stickleback,Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2024Article
- Adaptive tail-length evolution in deer mice is associated with differential Hoxd13 expression in early development.Nature ecology & evolution · 2024Article
- Rapid evolution of body plans.Nature ecology & evolution · 2024Article
- Whole-genome Comparisons Identify Repeated Regulatory Changes Underlying Convergent Appendage Evolution in Diverse Fish Lineages.Molecular biology and evolution · 2023Article
- Exploring plant cis-regulatory elements at single-cell resolution: overcoming biological and computational challenges to advance plant research.The Plant journal : for cell and molecular biology · 2023Review
- Whole-genome comparisons identify repeated regulatory changes underlying convergent appendage evolution in diverse fish lineages.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
12 authors at 6 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Understanding the mechanisms leading to new traits or additional features in organisms is a fundamental goal of evolutionary biology. We show that HOXDB regulatory changes have been used repeatedly in different fish genera to alter the length and number of the prominent dorsal spines used to classify stickleback species. In Gasterosteus aculeatus (typically 'three-spine sticklebacks'), a variant HOXDB allele is genetically linked to shortening an existing spine and adding an additional spine. In Apeltes quadracus (typically 'four-spine sticklebacks'), a variant HOXDB allele is associated with lengthening a spine and adding an additional spine in natural populations. The variant alleles alter the same non-coding enhancer region in the HOXDB locus but do so by diverse mechanisms, including single-nucleotide polymorphisms, deletions and transposable element insertions. The independent regulatory changes are linked to anterior expansion or contraction of HOXDB expression. We propose that associated changes in spine lengths and numbers are partial identity transformations in a repeating skeletal series that forms major defensive structures in fish. Our findings support the long-standing hypothesis that natural Hox gene variation underlies key patterning changes in wild populations and illustrate how different mutational mechanisms affecting the same region may produce opposite gene expression changes with similar phenotypic outcomes.
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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.