The Wnt signal transduction pathway has essential roles in the formation of the primary body
axis during development, cellular differentiation and tissue homeostasis. This animal …

Sponges (phylum Porifera) are a diverse taxon of benthic aquatic animals of great
ecological, commercial, and biopharmaceutical importance. They are arguably the earliest …

The genes of cellular cooperation that evolved with multicellularity about a billion years ago
are the same genes that malfunction to cause cancer. We hypothesize that cancer is an …

Sponges (Porifera) are among the earliest evolving metazoans. Their filter-feeding body
plan based on choanocyte chambers organized into a complex aquiferous system is so …

Sponges have become the focus of studies on molecular evolution and the evolution of
animal body plans due to their ancient branching point in the metazoan lineage. Whereas …

Abrupt appearance of major bilaterian clades in the fossil record during the first three stages
of the Cambrian Period has puzzled the scientific world since 1830s. Many proposed causes …

It is well known today that opine production anaerobic pathways are analogs to the classical
glycolytic pathway (lactate production pathway). These pathways, catalyzed by a group of …

Abstract Background The R-RAS2 is a small GTPase highly similar to classical RAS proteins
at the regulatory and signaling levels. The high evolutionary conservation of R-RAS2, its …

Sponges are one of the simplest, and probably the oldest (earliest branching) multicellular
lineage of extant animals. Although their embryonic development has been intensively …

Silicateins are unique enzymes of sponges (phylum Porifera) that template and catalyze the
polymerization of nanoscale silicate to siliceous skeletal elements. These multifunctional …