Our research on the evolution of insect wings was featured in Miami News!
Tomoyasu’s research helps solve the centuries-old mystery of the origin of insect wings
And here is the second article, more about our lab.
Yoshi Tomoyasu’s evo-devo lab: Behind the scenes
Thanks, Susan Meikle (University News and Communications), for the great articles!
Just to show you the beauty of this beetle! A larger version is available from here.
Our paper describing the tissues transforming into wings in the Hox mutants of Tribolium is now published in Arthropod Structure & Development!
We found that ectopic wing tissues are sometimes formed even inside of the beetle body, and was also able to show that two distinct tissues (of tergal and pleural nature) can independently transform into wings. This work was only possible because of hours and hours of dedicated works by Maddy and Courtney!
Also, check out the entire issue, which is the insect wing special issue: “Wings and Powered Flight: Core Novelties in Insect Evolution“. A lot of cool insect wing papers!!
We went to Toledo to collect “some” mayflies. Amazing experience witnessing their mass emergence!
We attended the 11th Annual Arthropod Genomics Symposium held at The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. We had many interesting presentations in a very interactive atmosphere. Courtney, Kevin, Nelchi, Kangxu, and Maddy presented their research.
And, yes, Yoshi really used the HotWheel scooter at the conference (because of the torn calf muscles)…
Maddy, Jake, and Sean presented their projects at the 2018 Undergraduate Research Forum!
And here are the pictures of Grad student mentor/undergrad researcher duos!
Our research was featured in the NY Times!
Thanks, Asher Elbein for the great coverage! You can read the article from here.
Also, here is another nice article on the WIRE, which mentions our research. A very comprehensive article covering various aspects of insects and insect wings. We highly recommend it!
“A Bug’s World: the Story of How Wings Set Insects Free to Colonise Earth“
Our paper on establishing enhancer studies in beetles is now published in Development! Hope the approach and recourses we established will help facilitate more enhancer studies in non-Drosophila insects :-)
We made all of our FAIRE data available (NCBI GEO link here), so you can take a look at your genes and hunt for your enhancers. The piggyBac reporter plasmids reported in the paper are now also showcased in this page. More new constructs coming soon!
This work was not possible without the help of the awesome collaborators, Marc Halfon (University at Buffalo), Dan McKay (UNC Chapel Hill), Ezzat El-Sherif (Naturwissenschaftliche Fakultät), as well as the dedicated work of Yi-Ting and other members!
Our mini-review recapping the insect wing origin debate and featuring a recent cool paper from Mann and Estella labs is now published on Current Biology.
“Sometime in the Devonian, perhaps about 400 million years ago, insects became the first clade to conquer the sky. Recent evo-devo studies have begun to unravel the mysterious origin of the flight structure that made insects into extraordinary six-legged fliers.”
Hope this will be a good primer when you want to learn how six legged flying buggers have evolved! link
Our work has been featured on some science news outlets. Here are some links!
Growing wings on beetle abdomens provides another clue in the mystery of where insect wings come from. The VERGE
Image of the Day: Ectopic Wings. The Scientist
The origin of insect wings has been revealed by gene editing. New Scientist
Also, here is the behind-the-paper story written by David. Very fun to read. Highly recommend!
Can a beetle with 12 extra wings help explore the evolutionary origin of insect wings? Nature ecology & evolution Community
