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Humans are chordates, which together with echinoderms and hemichordates belong to deuterostomes. Their embryogenesis are comparable, but develop into distinct body forms. To understand developmental mechanisms of deuterostomes and their evolutionary history, Research Fellow Yi-Hsien Su and the Marine Research Station Chief Jr-Kai Yu at ICOB collaborated with a Spanish team to globally analyze gene expression dynamics and their regulation during development of a hemichordate from Penghu. The research team deciphered a biphasic regulatory program and proposed that gastrulation is the stage of highest molecular similarity among deuterostomes. This study provides a developmental foundation for the deuterostome common ancestor. How chordates evolved unique body plan from such a foundation would be an important direction for future studies.

This study was published on October 18, 2024, in Nature Ecology and Evolution. The Taiwan team includes Che-Yi Lin, Tzu-Pei Fan, Ching-Yi Lin, and Yi-Chih Chen. The study is supported by funding from ICOB and grants from Academia Sinica (AS-GC-111-L01) and the National Science and Technology Council, Taiwan.