Sea Urchins and living beings: March 29th

What does shape a living organism? Why from a fertilized egg of a human being develops a child and from an egg of a sea urchin, apparently very similar to that of humans, develops instead a sea urchin?

Ina Maria Arnone, researcher of Anton Dohrn Zoological Station will talk with our visitors, on the morning of Sunday, March 29th, in the Science Centre.

The embryo of the sea urchin, as other marine organisms, has been used for over a century for studies of biology. In Anton Dohrn Zoological Station of Naples an important discovery has been made that has proved one of the cornerstones of biology work of a German scientist, Theodor Boveri, that more than a hundred years ago proved, using embryos of the sea urchin, that only embryos that contain a specific number of chromosomes are able to complete embryonic development.

This discovery has allowed us to understand that allinformation necessary for the development of an organism are contained in its DNA. And this is true for all organisms to humans, such as the sea urchin.

In modern research of developmental biology of sea urchin embryos, as well as other marine organisms model, still play an important role in the study of gene regulation and allow us to decode the information contained in DNA, which instruct its function every single cell of an organism.

Arnone per Citta della scienza
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