脊椎動物胚の左右非対称性成立機構について─ 内臓と脳神経系の左右性決定の研究小史 ─

概要

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In vertebrates, the heart, visceral organs and part of the central nervous systemundergo left-right asymmetrical morphogenesis. In the late 1990s, many important genes that are expressed left-right asymmetrically during embryonic stages have been identified. Among them, nodal, lefty and pitx2 play a pivotal role in the specification of left-right orientation, andare commonly expressed in the left lateral plate mesoderm at the somite stage in vertebrate model organisms. The central nervous system of lower vertebrates (teleosts and amphibians) develops a left-right asymmetrical neural circuit related to the afferent and efferent projections to the habenulae, the paired nuclei of the dorsal diencephalon. In teleosts, left-handedparapineal projections to the left habenula nucleus and left-right asymmetrical gene expressions in the habenulae are the most attractive lateralized phenomena for developmental biologists. Here, nodal and (possibly) pitx2 are again the key genes for left-right specification of the habenulae and pineal complex. In this review, we overview the history of the molecular studyof left-right specification in vertebrate embryos.
神奈川大学の論文
2009-10-20