The Use of Developmental Sequences for Assessing Evolutionary Change in Gastropods*

Abstract

First introduced by Ernst Haeckel in the nineteenth century, the use of developmental sequences has recently seen a renaissance as part of the study of the evolutionary biology of embryos; here we review briefly the literature describing gastropod developmental sequences, appraising the extent to which it has contributed to this renaissance. Gastropods have figured extensively in studies of early development with cell lineage analysis available for numerous taxa. Phylogenetic comparisons of these data reveal strong evolutionary signals, particularly in relation to early cell divisions. In contrast, although the description of post cell division developmental stages, including functional elements of development, in gastropods is extensive, interspecific comparisons are rare and tend to focus instead on developmental mode. However, a recent comparison of the sequence of functional and morphological events in a clade of basommatophoran snails demonstrated several alterations in the timing of developmental events (i.e., heterochronies) across the phylogeny. Many gastropod groups may offer the potential to carry out similar investigations of the evolutionary importance of sequence heterochrony and to try to unravel the mechanistic basis for such patterns in developmental sequences.