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Spatiotemporal expression of a twist homolog in the leech Helobdella austinensis

Development Genes and Evolution volume 227, pages 245–252 (2017)Cite this article

Abstract

Genes of the twist family encode bHLH transcription factors known to be involved in the regulation and differentiation of early mesoderm. Here, we report our characterization of Hau-twist, a twist homolog from the leech Helobdella austinensis, a tractable lophotrochozoan representative. Hau-twist was expressed in segmental founder cells of the mesodermal lineage, in subsets of cells within the mesodermal lineage of the germinal plate, in circumferential muscle fibers of a provisional integument during segmentation and organogenesis stages and on the ventral side of the developing proboscis. Thus, consistent with other systems, our results suggest that twist gene of the leech Helobdella might function in mesoderm differentiation.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank members of the Weisblat Lab for advice and support. This work was supported by the National Institute of Health [NIH R01 grant GM 074619 to DAW], “Cooperative Research Program for Agriculture Science and Technology Development [Project No. PJ011661]” Rural Development Administration, and by a grant from the Collaborative Genome Program (20140428) funded by the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, Republic of Korea. This work was supported by the research grant of the Chungbuk National University in 2014.

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Affiliations

  1. School of Biological Sciences, College of Natural Sciences, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju, Chungbuk, 28644, Republic of Korea

    Jin-Se Kim, Brenda Irene Medina Jiménez, Hee-Jin Kwak & Sung-Jin Cho

  2. Department of Life Sciences, Chung-Ang University, Seoul, 156-756, Republic of Korea

    Soon Cheol Park

  3. Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, 385 LSA, University of California, Berkeley, CA, 94720-3200, USA

    Ping Xiao, David A. Weisblat & Sung-Jin Cho

Authors
  1. Jin-Se Kim
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  2. Brenda Irene Medina Jiménez
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  3. Hee-Jin Kwak
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  4. Soon Cheol Park
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  5. Ping Xiao
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  6. David A. Weisblat
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  7. Sung-Jin Cho
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to David A. Weisblat or Sung-Jin Cho.

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Communicated by Mark Q. Martindale

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Kim, JS., Jiménez, B.I.M., Kwak, HJ. et al. Spatiotemporal expression of a twist homolog in the leech Helobdella austinensis . Dev Genes Evol 227, 245–252 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00427-017-0585-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00427-017-0585-4

Keywords

  • Mesoderm
  • Lophotrochozoa
  • twist gene
  • Leech