The role of gene regulatory evolution in weapon diversification: Insights from comparative genomics, chromatin profiling, and functional analyses of BMP signaling in horned beetles
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Condition-responsive growth is a common feature of multicellular development, during which organisms integrate genetic and environmental signals to adjust their phenotype. However, the molecular properties shaping condition-responsive diversification remain poorly understood. The beetle genus Onthophagus offers promising opportunities to investigate this question, given its diversity of sex- and nutrition-responsive phenotypes, including horns - novel, secondary sexual weapons used in reproductive competition. We compared the gene regulatory properties of horns in two closely related species exhibiting highly specialized sex- and nutrition-biased phenotypes. We found a dynamic cis-regulatory landscape in developing horn tissue, shaped by mutational accumulation across species, condition-specific changes in chromatin accessibility within species, and the acquisition of lineage-specific regulatory elements. Many of these putative regulatory regions include binding site motifs of critical developmental regulatory genes, including members of the bone morphogenetic protein signaling pathway. We provide functional evidence that two proteins in this pathway have been co-opted for horn development, influencing the shape and size of this trait across species, sexes, and nutritional states. These findings provide evidence that evolutionarily labile cis-regulatory interactions may evolve alongside diversification of condition-specific traits, potentially modifying the activity of conserved developmental pathways over short evolutionary timescales.
Source: PLoS Genetics
Institutions: Indiana University, Mississippi State University
Language: English
Domain: Life Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $3,043
Awards: Postdoctoral Fellowship FY22: Cis-regulatory basis of developmental plasticity and growth in the development and evolution of beetle horns, a class of highly diversified weapons, Origin and diversification of evolutionary novelties: insights through the study of beetle horns, insect wings, and bilaterian heads
OpenAlex ID: W7223130887