SoxE gene duplication and the evolution of chondrogenesis

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Cartilage is an important component of the vertebrate skeleton, but its evolutionary origin is poorly understood. Neural crest cells evolved in vertebrates and are required for the development of numerous vertebrate-specific characters, including cartilage within the head. The central goal of Dr. McCauley's research is to determine how the evolution and development of cartilage in vertebrates is related to the duplication of a single Sox E gene that is also present in invertebrates. The duplicated SoxE genes, Sox8, Sox9, and Sox10 play an important role in neural crest specification, but the importance of this gene duplication to the evolution of facial cartilage is not known. Dr. McCauley will use a molecular approach to interfere with the function of individual Sox proteins in a primitive vertebrate, the sea lamprey, to determine their roles in the development of cartilage from neural crest. The lamprey was chosen because of its primitive relationship to other vertebrate species. Results of this research are expected to reveal how lamprey SoxE genes regulate cartilage development and whether the fundamental developmental mechanisms of cartilage formation derived from neural crest cells are common to all vertebrates. This research will have broad impacts for the scientific and education communities. These studies will integrate research and higher education and will involve undergraduate students from diverse backgrounds in original laboratory research, in addition to training graduate students and post-doctoral investigators. Results will be of interest to a diverse audience since studies on the "primitive" lamprey are relevant to understanding the evolution and development of "advanced" model vertebrates. Techniques developed and used in this research will also be applied to a laboratory course currently under development by Dr. McCauley. Students in this course will learn how molecular, developmental, and bioinformatics tools are used to address questions related to the evolution of novel traits.