Hormonal Organization and Activation: Evolutionary Implications and Questions
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1
Cornell University, Psychology/Neurobiology and Behavior, United States
Comparative endocrinology is a fascinating field of science in part because it can integrate ultimate and proximate causation. Research on sexual dimorphism and sexual differentiation has excellent potential for this kind of integration. Vertebrate comparative endocrinologists have made many important discoveries about the role of genes and sex steroid hormones in the organization and activation of sexually differentiated behavior, brain function, anatomy and physiology. In addition to taxonomically general principles and conserved features, there is also striking diversity in sexual differentiation processes. Much of the evolutionary basis of this diversity (its phylogenetic history and adaptive functions) is not well understood. A set of questions is raised to illustrate this point, with an emphasis on mechanisms of sexual dimorphism in body size and ornamentation, sexual differentiation of avian behavior, and the puzzle of the phylogeny of vertebrate sex determining mechanisms. Applying tree thinking and other concepts from evolutionary biology to developmental and adult mechanisms holds promise for eventually answering some of these questions.
Keywords:
evolution,
Hormonal organization,
Japanese quail,
phylogeny,
sex determination,
sex steroid hormones,
sexual differentiation,
sexual dimorphism
Conference:
NASCE 2011: The inaugural meeting of the North American Society for Comparative Endocrinology, Ann Arbor, United States, 13 Jul - 16 Jul, 2011.
Presentation Type:
Plenary
Topic:
Sex determination and differentiation
Citation:
Adkins-Regan
E
(2011). Hormonal Organization and Activation: Evolutionary Implications and Questions.
Front. Endocrinol.
Conference Abstract:
NASCE 2011: The inaugural meeting of the North American Society for Comparative Endocrinology.
doi: 10.3389/conf.fendo.2011.04.00102
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Received:
01 Aug 2011;
Published Online:
09 Aug 2011.
*
Correspondence:
Prof. Elizabeth Adkins-Regan, Cornell University, Psychology/Neurobiology and Behavior, Ithaca, New York, 14850, United States, er12@cornell.edu