Abstract
D’Arcy Thompson’s 1917 treatise, On Growth and Form, articulated what might reasonably be considered the First Law of Morphogenesis: “... the form of an object is a ‘diagram of forces’... which have been impressed upon it...” (Thompson 1917). This chapter is an informal, speculative essay on the emergence of form during Drosophila eye development and the forces that impress this form. It reviews selected events of retinal morphogenesis and considers mechanisms potentially responsible. In most instances, the molecular basis of morphogenesis in the eye is poorly understood; in many cases, correlation and causality remain to be distinguished. An integrated, realistic force diagram of the fly eye lies in the future.
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© 2002 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Ready, D.F. (2002). Drosophila Compound Eye Morphogenesis: Blind Mechanical Engineers?. In: Moses, K. (eds) Drosophila Eye Development. Results and Problems in Cell Differentiation, vol 37. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-45398-7_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-45398-7_12
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-53640-3
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-45398-7
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