Perhaps one of the most fascinating and challenging questions in evolutionary biology is the origin and generation of biodiversity. What causes the tremendous taxonomic diversity of extinct and present-day organisms, and how do we explain the great diversity of forms observed in most lineages? The course of research I am developing during my dissertation work tries to answer these questions by attempting to clarify a fundamental but poorly understood issue in biology, the genotype-phenotype map. I am particularly interested in understanding the genetic mechanisms of phenotypic variation and how they contribute to the evolution of traits between lineages. I focus primarily on the evolution of gene regulation in a broad sense. I use approaches at the interface between molecular evolution, population genetics and evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) to examine the effects of trans and cis evolution on gene regulation. 

• fgf17a is in fact a fgf8 duplicate

• fgf17b is the ortholog of tetrapod FGF17

• fgf8 and fgf18 were duplicated early in teleosts, compatible with the ray-fin fish genome duplication

• fgf8 duplicates have common and unique expression patterns indicating that tissue
  specialization followed the duplication event

• comparison of fgf8 expression patterns in zebrafish and stickleback suggest lineage-specific independent subfunction partitioning and the acquisition or the loss of ortholog functions

• differences in the expression of fgf8a in the AER of the pectoral fin bud in zebrafish and stickleback coupled with the role of fgf16 and fgf24 in teleost pectoral appendage formation show that different Fgf genes may play similar roles in limb development in various vertebrates        

       

• Jovelin R, He X, Amores A, Yan YL, Shi R, Qin B, Roe B, Cresko WA, Postlethwait JH. 2007. Duplication and divergence of fgf8 functions in teleost development and evolution. JEZ: Molecular and Developmental Evolution. [Reprint]

• Jovelin R, Phillips PC. 2005. Functional constraint and divergence in the G protein family in Caenorhabditis elegans and Caenorhabditis briggsae. Molecular Genetics and Genomics 273:299-310 [Reprint]

• Jovelin R, Ajie BC, Phillips PC. 2003. Molecular evolution and quantitative variation for chemosensory behaviour in the nematode genus Caenorhabditis. Molecular Ecology 12:1325-1337 [Reprint]

• Justine JL, Jovelin R, Neifar L, Mollaret I, Lim LHS, Hendrix S, Euzet L. 2002. Phylogenetic positions of the Bothtrematidae and Necalceostomatidae (Monopisthocotylea Monogeneans) inferred from 28S rDNA sequences. Comparative Parasitology 69(1):20-25 [Reprint]

• Jovelin R, Justine JL. 2001. Phylogenetic relationships within the polyopisthocotylean monogeneans (Platyhelminthes) inferred from partial 28S rDNA sequences. International Journal for Parasitology 31:393-401 [Reprint]

• Desdevises Y, Jovelin R, Jousson O, Morand S. 2000. Comparison of ribosomal DNA sequences of Lamellodiscus spp. (Monogenea, Diplectanidae) parasitising Pagellus (Sparidae, Teleostei) in the North Mediterranean Sea: species divergence and coevolutionary interactions. International Journal for Parasitology 30(6):741-746 [Reprint]

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Jovelin R, Dunham JP, Sung FS, Phillips PC. Poster. UO & IU joint NSF-IGERT training program. Bloomington, IN. October 2006. 

Jovelin R, Dunham JP, Sung FS, Phillips PC. Talk. Society for the Study of Evolution. New-York, NY. June, 2006.

Jovelin R, Dunham JP, Sung FS, Phillips PC. Poster. EMBO workshop. Oeiras, Portugal. May, 2006.

Jovelin R, Phillips PC. Poster. EVO-WIBO. Port Townsend, WA. April 2004.