Franziska Anni Franke, Isabell Schumann, Lars Hering, Georg Mayer
Pax family genes encode a class of transcription factors that regulate various developmental processes. To shed light on the evolutionary history of these genes in Panarthropoda (Onychophora + Tardigrada + Arthropoda), we analyzed the Pax repertoire in the embryonic and adult transcriptomes of the onychophoran Euperipatoides rowelli. Our data revealed homologs of all five major bilaterian Pax subfamilies in this species, including Pax2/5/8, Pax4/6, Pox-neuro, Pax1/9/Pox-meso, and Pax3/7. In addition, we identified a new Pax member, pax-α, which does not fall into any other known Pax subfamily but instead clusters in the heterogenic Pax-α/β clade containing deuterostome, ecdysozoan, and lophotrochozoan gene sequences...
January 2015: Evolution & Development