Genomic Regulatory Systems: In Development and Evolution [Hardcover]

Eric H. Davidson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 25, 2001

The interaction between biology and evolution has been the subject of great interest in recent years. Because evolution is such a highly debated topic, a biologically oriented discussion will appeal not only to scientists and biologists but also to the interested lay person. This topic will always be a subject of controversy and therefore any breaking information regarding it is of great interest.
The author is a recognized expert in the field of developmental biology and has been instrumental in elucidating the relationship between biology and evolution. The study of evolution is of interest to many different kinds of people and Genomic Regulatory Systems: In Development and Evolution is written at a level that is very easy to read and understand even for the nonscientist.

* Contents Include
* Regulatory Hardwiring: A Brief Overview of the Genomic Control Apparatus and Its Causal Role in Development and Evolution
* Inside the Cis-Regulatory Module: Control Logic and How the Regulatory Environment Is Transduced into Spatial Patterns of Gene Expression
* Regulation of Direct Cell-Type Specification in Early Development
* The Secret of the Bilaterians: Abstract Regulatory Design in Building Adult Body Parts
* Changes That Make New Forms: Gene Regulatory Systems and the Evolution of Body Plans

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Davidson has written a thoroughly engaging and visually attractive book...does an admirable job in synthesising and explicating a massive and complex literature in an accessible style. ...stands out in contrast to various other books on 'evo-devo' that have recently been published, through the adoption of a narrow focus which allows a great depth of treatment."
-Ronald A. Jenner, University of Amsterdam, in THE PALAEONTOLOGICAL ASSOCATION NEWSLETTER (2001)
"Eric Davidson has made seminal contributions to our understanding of transcriptional regulation and, over 30 years ago, was among the first to comment on the importance of studying the evolution of gene networks."
-SCIENCE (June 2001)
"This is a fantastic book!...No one better than Eric Davidson was able to synthesize the whole field of transcriptional regulation as it relates to development...Two points are specially striking in this book, the strength of the intellectual thread running through the book and the scholarly treatment of the most recent and pertinent data...To add to the pleasure, the book is loaded with beautiful documents, illustrating both primary experimental results and remarkable synthetic diagrams."
-ANDRÉ ADOUTTE, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (June 2001)
"The book is a serious scientific exposition, crafted with care, beautifully illustrated and very timely. Researchers and students alike will find the book a rich and challenging source of ideas, questions and linkages to the literature. It is the integrated genomic view of the subject, however, that makes the book so valuable. We should never think of evolution and embryogenesis in the same way again."
-DAVID J. GALAS, Keck Graduate Institute (February 2001)
"Davidson provides a vivid account of how cis-regulatory DNA integrates complex signals to control the on/off activities of gene batteries during metazoan development. The often-neglected "non-coding" genomic DNA is finally brought to life through the use of illuminating examples that span a broad spectrum of experimental systems. The book should appeal to students and researchers in the areas of development and evolution, as well as to computational biologists who are interested in modeling gene networks."
--M. LEVINE, UC Berkeley
"Probably the highest praise I can give a book after finishing it is to want to start reading it all over again. This is that sort of book... a great job in synthesizing enormous quantity of information into a digestible perspective on regulatory patterns and their importance for evolution. I learned an incredible amount from the book..."
--D. ERWIN, Smithsonian Institute
"Davidson's book is a fascinating exposition of the role regulatory networks play in both development and evolution. He writes with a clarity and insight that propels us into some of the most fascinating issues in contemporary biology. A must-read for all true students of biology."
--DR. LEROY HOOD, Institute for Systems Biology

From the Back Cover

Genomic Regulatory Systems is about the gene regulatory programs built into the DNA of every animal. Such programs control the process of development, and changes in their organization are the underlying cause of animal evolution.
The book takes a "genome's eye" view of the mechanism of spatial gene regulation and of developmental processes ranging from simple forms of embryogenesis to elegant mechanisms of pattern formation. Throughout, discussions of development and evolution are intertwined. The text takes an in-depth look at how the hardwired control systems of the genome work and offers an explanation for evolutionary change in animal body plans.
Eric H. Davidson is a major contributor to the field of developmental biology and has long been interested in the relationship between development and evolution. Genomic Regulatory Systems is authoritative but easy-to-read and will appeal to professionals and readers from a wide variety of scientific backgrounds.
Contents Include
*Regulatory Hardwiring: A Brief Overview of the Genomic Control Apparatus and Its Causal Role in Development and Evolution
* Inside the Cis-Regulatory Module: Control Logic and How the Regulatory Environment Is Transduced into Spatial Patterns of Gene Expression
* Regulation of Direct Cell-Type Specification in Early Development
* The Secret of the Bilaterians: Abstract Regulatory Design in Building Adult Body Parts
* Changes That Make New Forms: Gene Regulatory Systems and the Evolution of Body Plans

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 261 pages
• Publisher: Academic Press; 1st edition (January 25, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0122053516
• ISBN-13: 978-0122053511
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7.7 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,234,117 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Meaty, but decidedly not for beginners, August 25, 2001

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[e-mail] - See all my reviews

This review is from: Genomic Regulatory Systems: In Development and Evolution (Hardcover)

On the back of this book's cover we read, "authoritative and easy to read". We may grant the first, but hardly the second. Davidson has worked for a long time at the cutting edge of cell-biological research, and makes it quite clear that our knowledge of the process by which the genes produce the organism they give rise to, is far from complete. Presenting numerous interesting examples, always supported by excellent illustrations, he offers us a fascinating sketch of the way the genetic DNA material in the chromosomes is translated into a developmental process in the organism, from fertilized egg to adult. He carries us far beyond the revolutionary ideas in Darwin's "Origin of Species" from 1859, and also beyond the "Neo-Darwinians", whose ideas on evolution and development dominated most of the 20th century. Not being a biologist, but rather a historian of ideas, predominantly in the field of natural science, I am impressed by the recent advances in biology after Crick's and Watson's discovery of the DNA double spiral as the material basis of the genome. We might say that the Neo-Darwinists, like Darwin himself, regarded the genes as fairly independent "elements", or "atoms" of heredity, each responsible for its own part (or characteristic trait) of the organism. The essentially random variation of those elements provided the raw material for Natural Selection, and thereby Evolution. That was also for a long time my own view. This book has forced me to adopt a new perspective. However, it seems to me that the "elemental" view of the genes has an entrenched position among the general public, who use it in arguments both for and against the Darwinian theory of Evolution by Natural Selection. Davidson insists that the genes are by no means independent elements. They are very much dependent on each other. In particular, a rather limited number of them, which he calls regulatory genes, are especially important in evolution (and of course also in the development from the fertilized egg to the adult). He also stresses very strongly that the characteristics of an organism are not at all the creation of individual genes, but of a considerable number of genes working in concert, to a large extent orchestrated by the regulatory genes. Thus the whole process stands out as much more powerful, but also as extremely complicated. This is as it should be: who would deny that life is a complex phenomenon? To anybody interested in Evolution -- and in Man's place in Nature -- Davidson's book provides much food for thought. But note: unless you have a good grounding in biology, do not expect an "easy read".

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Dense but worthwhile reading, February 11, 2002

By 

DR P. Dash "drdneuro" - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Genomic Regulatory Systems: In Development and Evolution (Hardcover)

This book is complementary too, but on a more advanced level than Sean Carroll's From DNA To Diversity, which I strongly recommend as a great intro book to evo-devo. Davidson's book is tough going in places, which is why I gave it one star off, but the material is in fairness quite complex. He emphasizes the role of cis-regulatory sequences in genes and the structure of the systems that regulate gene expression in development and evolution in some detail. It becomes clear how minor mutations in the regulatory part of a gene can transform how it is expressed, and why the importance for evolution in mutations in gene expression is clearly much greater than for mutations in the protein coding sequence. His explanation for what is responsible for the incredible homologies in, for example, the pax 6 gene that regulates eye development across phyla is very illuminating. A must read for anybody interested in the molecular basis for development and evolution.

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Clear introductory material, January 20, 2002

By 

Jon Claerbout (Stanford, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Genomic Regulatory Systems: In Development and Evolution (Hardcover)

Genomic Regulatory Systems : development and evolution, by
Eric Davidson

The book is about how the genome actually works in [embryo?] development.
It is a beautiful book with many attractive illustrations.
The book's introductory material and
that of each chapter is clear and interesting.
I enjoyed about 3 valuable hours with this book
before getting lost because of my inadequate background (nonbio major).
He gives 4 reasons why this field has been so exciting over the past decade:
(1) We can now bring regulatory hard wiring at
the DNA nucleotide level into concise functional focus,
(2) We now have the full DNA sequence,
(3) Good minds from evolution and from development have converged,
(4) A lot of confusion in molecular phylogeny has been cleared up.

The book is mostly about bilaterians.
The size of the genome within a clade [some very similar critters]
can vary by a factor of ten whereas
the variation in protein coding (mRNA) is much smaller.
Amniotes [embryo in sac] have 4 hox clusters on 4 chromosomes.
There are remarkable examples of diverse usage of similar genes
of diverse organisms.
I don't think he defines the difference between cis- regulatory elements
[within the chromosome] and trans- [across chromosomes] so I needed
to do some guessing or find some other references.
Next time I take another look at this book,
I'll probably restart back about page 9.
I noticed on page 110 on the morphogenesis of heart parts
that different genes were identified for right and left sides
of the heart -- a matter of interest to me as my apparantly healthy 25 year old son ...died suddenly and unexpectedly
of natural causes,***many tears***, presumably a heart attack.
Perhaps the next decade or two will bring life-saving diagnostics.