Throughout the Earth’s history, evolution has developed a great number of different organisms with an incredible variety of forms and sizes. These morphologies are tailored during development by modifying the expression pattern of key genes and by the modulation of hormone activation. The main goal of this lab is, therefore, to understand how changes in gene and hormone regulation affect morphology evolution, particularly in relation to the origin of insect metamorphosis. The Evolution and Developmental Biology lab addresses these questions by comparing the development and metamorphosis of Drosophila melanogaster, Tribolium castaneum and Thermobia domestica.
Principal Investigator
Ongoing projects
Publications
Martín D.; Chafino S. and Franch-Marro X. 2020. How stage identity is established in insects: the role of the Metamorphic Gene Network. Curr Opin Insect Sci. 43:29-38. doi: 10.1016/j.cois.2020.10.002.
Cruz J.; Martin D.; Franch X. 2020. Egfr Signaling Is a Major Regulator of Ecdysone
Biosynthesis in the Drosophila Prothoracic Gland. Current Biology.doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2020.01.092
Miguel C.; Cruz J.; Martin D.; Franch-Marro X. 2019. Dual role of FGF in proliferation and endoreplication of Drosophila tracheal adult progenitor cells.. Journal of Molecular Cell Biology,. doi: 10.1093/jmcb/mjz055
Lin X.; De Schutter K.; Chafino S.; Franch-Marro X.; Martín D.; Smagghe G. 2019. Target of rapamycin (TOR) determines appendage size during pupa formation of the red flour beetle Tribolium castaneum. Journal of Insect Physiology. 117 doi: doi.org/10.1016/j.jinsphys.2019.103902
Chafino S.; Ureña E.; Casanova J.; Casacuberta E.; Franch-Marro X.and Martín D. 2019. Upregulation of E93 Gene Expression Acts as the Trigger for Metamorphosis Independently of the Threshold Size in the Beetle Tribolium castaneum.Cell Reports. 11(4):1178–1191. doi: doi.org/10.1016/j.celrep.2019.03.094