Dinosaurs, Chameleons, Humans, and Evo‐Devo Path: Linking Étienne Geoffroy's Teratology, Waddington's Homeorhesis, Alberch's Logic of “Monsters,” and Goldschmidt Hopeful “Monsters”

Abstract

Since the rise of evo-devo (evolutionary developmental biology) in the 1980s, few authors have attempted to combine the increasing knowledge obtained from the study of model organisms and human medicine with data from comparative anatomy and evolutionary biology in order to investigate the links between development, pathology, and macroevolution. Fortunately, this situation is slowly changing, with a renewed interest in evolutionary developmental pathology (evo-devo-path) in the past decades, as evidenced by the idea to publish this special, and very timely, issue on "Developmental Evolution in Biomedical Research." As all of us have recently been involved, independently, in works related in some way or another with evolution and developmental anomalies, we decided to join our different perspectives and backgrounds in the present contribution for this special issue. Specifically, we provide a brief historical account on the study of the links between evolution, development, and pathologies, followed by a review of the recent work done by each of us, and then by a general discussion on the broader developmental and macroevolutionary implications of our studies and works recently done by other authors. Our primary aims are to highlight the strength of studying developmental anomalies within an evolutionary framework to understand morphological diversity and disease by connecting the recent work done by us and others with the research done and broader ideas proposed by authors such as Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, Waddington, Goldschmidt, Gould, and Per Alberch, among many others to pave the way for further and much needed work regarding abnormal development and macroevolution.

Where is, in 2017, the evo in evo‐devo (evolutionary developmental biology)?

“…This trend was unfortunately mainly lost during the second half of the 20st century, and begun to be mainly recovered in the beginning of the 21st century by authors such as Galis and her colleagues (e.g., Galis, van der Sluijs, van Dooren, Metz, & Nussbaumer, ; Van Dongen, Ten Broek, Wijnaendts, & Galis, ; Bots et al., ; see recent reviews by e.g. Guinard, ; Diogo, ; Diogo, Guinard, & Diaz, ; see also, e.g., Laubicher and Maienschein, ). But there is clearly still much to do at this level, and one of the aspects that should be taken further in consideration is the study of phenotypic variation in general and of variations and pathologies of not only the hard tissues, but also of the soft tissues, of humans in particular.…”

“…Similarly, it should be recognized that some talks in the 2017 meeting directly addressed the connection between evo‐devo and human pathologies and thus medicine, that is, they could be considered as part of evo‐devo‐path :(Evolutionary Developmental Pathology: Diogo et al, ,b, ; Diogo, ) research. An emblematic example was Cliff Tabin's talk on metabolic evolution in cave fish, in which he directly made connections with pathological human conditions such as diabetes.…”

Order Through Disorder: The Characteristic Variability of Systems

“…It was proposed that "genes and development cannot be dissociated as different levels of interaction" (Alberch, 1989). Associations between evolution, development and pathologies underlie biological system development and macroevolution (Diogo et al, 2017). These were suggested as tools for understanding human anomalies and variations, homeotic transformations, and muscle-skeleton associations in limb and facial muscles.…”

Reflections on Bateson's rule: Solving an old riddle about why extra legs are mirror‐symmetric

“…Fgf8, fibroblast growth factor-8; Grem1, gremlin-1; Shh, sonic hedgehog HELD AND SESSIONS | 233 once wrote a lyrical tribute to such alternative anatomies, which look hideous to our eyes but seem perfectly normal to the participating cells because they are faithfully following the cues they encounter in their immediate neighborhood (Alberch, 1989). He aptly entitled his essay "The Logic of Monsters" (Diogo et al, 2017), and that same term certainly applies to the extra legs that obey Bateson's rule as well.…”

“…P. T. Barnum would have called them freaks. Richard Goldschmidt called them “hopeful monsters” (Piternick, ) to stress their potential as progenitors of new species, assuming they confer an adaptive benefit (Diogo, Guinard, & Diaz, ). Saltations of this sort may have founded a few taxa (Lebreton et al, ), but they surely did not play the kind of cardinal role that Bateson and Goldschmidt envisioned (Dietrich, ; Theissen, ).…”