I am super excited to announce that my preprint with @DrMattBenton has just gone live! "The neuroblast timer gene nubbin exhibits functional redundancy with gap genes to regulate segment identity in Tribolium" https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.04.08.438913v1">https://www.biorxiv.org/content/1...

This project builds on an intriguing observation - the same series of genes is expressed temporally in insect neuroblasts (NBs), and spatially along the #Drosophila blastoderm. hb and Kr are #gapgenes - but apparently nubbin and castor aren& #39;t.

Using #HCR, we show that these genes are expressed in the same temporal order in the segment addition zone of #Tribolium, an insect with a more representative mode of segmentation

We show that RNAi against nubbin has little impact on axial patterning - because it acts redundantly with the gap genes giant and knirps. Knocking down all three genes simultaneously by triple eRNAi gives these amazing #leggybois

These three genes redundantly repress Kruppel expression in the abdomen, allowing abdominal #Hox genes to be expressed and abdominal segments to form normally.

Our findings suggest that nubbin might act as a gap gene in many insect species https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🪲" title="Beetle" aria-label="Emoji: Beetle">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🪰" title="Fly" aria-label="Emoji: Fly">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🦟" title="Mosquito" aria-label="Emoji: Mosquito">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🦗" title="Cricket" aria-label="Emoji: Cricket">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🪳" title="Cockroach" aria-label="Emoji: Cockroach">https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="🐞" title="Marienkäfer" aria-label="Emoji: Marienkäfer">(with its role sometimes masked by #redundancy), and support the idea that the gap gene network might have been #coopted from the neuroblast timer network

Please read the preprint if you are interested in: lovely HCRs; weird cuticles; #nubs; and wacky ideas about the evolution of the gap gene network and Hox gene regulation

A look behind the curtain of sanity in this thread: finding the triple knockdown phenotype was such a big deal for me that I baked a horrifying cake in its image and invited my lab to the "wedding" of nubbin, giant and knirps. PhDs, man.