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Abstract
I will describe my scientific journey aiming at understanding the fascinating question of how embryonic development evolves. My laboratory approached this initially using genome-scale comparative transcriptomics, establishing the molecular basis for the hourglass model of morphological evolution (an observation that embryos exhibit remarkable morphological similarity during mid-embryogenesis).
More recently, we tried to elucidate mechanistically how and why early embryogenesis appears so divergent between species. Using comparative embryology and biophysics, we discovered, that at least in insects, gastrulation morphogenesis is impacted by the interaction of the living tissue with the surrounding protective eggshells. The changing patterns of these regulated, local interactions allow us to speculate about the evolutionary significance of this process.
My laboratory is now in the process of expanding the repertoire of species with divergent developmental modes that we can study and compare. Using this approach we aim to map morphogenetic traits across the animal tree of life and establish the phylogeny of morphogenesis.
