Know more

Evolutionary and developmental biology aims to understand the ontogenetic variations that lead to the morphological variations observed between species. But can these variations occur very early, in the egg?
Animal development is initially controlled by maternal factors deposited during ovogenesis, which direct the early embryonic stages before the maternal-zygotic transition. We will explore the contribution of these maternal factors to the phenotypic evolution of a blind cavefish, using the two interfertile morphs of the species A. mexicanus. We propose a multiscale comparative developmental biology approach to characterize the evolution of maternal contribution in the cavernicolous morph (goal1), to understand its consequences (goal2), and to decipher its origins (goal3). CAVEMOM is the first study on the impact of the ultra-early maternal component in morphological evolution.
This project is coordinated by Sylvie Rétaux (CNRS). Julien Bobe is participating to the project