IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/nature/v454y2008i7201d10.1038_nature07108.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The evolutionary origin of flatfish asymmetry

Author

Listed:
  • Matt Friedman

    (Committee on Evolutionary Biology, University of Chicago, 1025 East 57th Street, Chicago, Illinois 60637, USA
    The Field Museum, 1400 South Lake Shore Drive, Chicago, Illinois 60605, USA)

Abstract

Evolution: How flatfish see eye-to-eye The asymmetry of flatfish is an exceptional morphological specialization that arises in development: starting from a symmetrical larva/juvenile, the skull is remodelled so that one eye migrates over the top of the skull to sit next to its fellow on one (or other) side of the animal. The evolutionary origins of this arrangement have been unclear. Matt Friedman re-examined Eocene (47-million-year-old) fossils of the fish Amphistium and describes a new genus that represents the most primitive flatfish known. In these fish, the migrating eye never gets further than the dorsal midline, even in fully adult fishes. This is a graphic example of a transitional form spotted in the fossil record, confirming that the evolution of the specialized flatfish bodyplan was a gradual process.

Suggested Citation

  • Matt Friedman, 2008. "The evolutionary origin of flatfish asymmetry," Nature, Nature, vol. 454(7201), pages 209-212, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:454:y:2008:i:7201:d:10.1038_nature07108
    DOI: 10.1038/nature07108
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature07108
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/nature07108?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Gattone, Stefano Antonio & De Sanctis, Angela & Russo, Tommaso & Pulcini, Domitilla, 2017. "A shape distance based on the Fisher–Rao metric and its application for shapes clustering," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 487(C), pages 93-102.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:454:y:2008:i:7201:d:10.1038_nature07108. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.