We’re working on rearing the praying mantis Tenodera sinensis. Photo by Jonchee Kao.

We strive not to be bound by the “model organism” limitation. We must find ways around poor experimental tractability, so that we can improve taxon sampling and have the means to study key clades. Thus, when necessary we develop new methods and resources, or extend existing ones, to apply chemical, molecular and genetic analyses to new study systems from many major branches of the largest group of animals on earth, the Arthropoda. This includes sequencing, assembling and annotating genomes and transcriptomes, optimizing embryonic injection protocols to deliver various gene interference reagents, and generating staging tables to allow standardized comparisons of development across experimental conditions.

Injecting early embryos of the large milkweed bug Oncopeltus fasciatus. Photos by Amaneet Lochab.

References

Establishment of CRISPR/Cas9-based knock-in in a hemimetabolous insect: targeted gene tagging in the cricket Gryllus bimaculatus. Matsuoka Y., Nakamura, T., Watanabe, T., Barnett, A.A., Mito T., Noji, S. and Extavour, C.G. bioRxiv, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.05.10.441399 (2024). [PubMed]
Cricket: The third domesticated insect. Mito T., Ishimaru Y., Watanabe T., Nakamura T., Ylla G., Noji S. and Extavour G.C. Current Topics in Developmental Biology, 147:291-306 (2022). [PubMed]
Genomics and genome editing techniques of crickets, an emerging model for insect biology and food science. Nakamura, T., Ylla, G., and Extavour, C.G. Current Opinion in Insect Science, 2:100881 (2022). [PubMed]
Insights into the genomic evolution of insects from cricket genomes. Ylla G., Nakamura T., Itoh T., Kajitani R., Atsuhi T., Sayuri T., Tetsuya B., Yoshiyasu I., Watanabe T., Fuketa M., Matsuoka Y., Barnett, A., Noji S., Mito T. and Extavour C.G. Communications Biology, 4(1):733 (2021). [PubMed]
Chapter 8: The Cricket Gryllus bimaculatus: Techniques for Quantitative and Functional Genetic Analyses of Cricket Biology. Kulkarni, A.* and Extavour, C.G.* Results and Problems in Cell Differentiation, Volume 68: Evo-Devo: Non-model Species in Cell and Developmental Biology (edited by Waclaw Tworzydlo and Szczepan M. Bilinski), 68:183-216 (2019).

Related Media: [PubMed]
Injecting Gryllus bimaculatus Eggs. Barry, S, Nakamura, T., Matsuoka, Y., Straub, C., Horch, H.W.* and Extavour, C.G. Journal of Visualized Experiments, Aug 22 (150):10.3791/59726 (2019). [PubMed]
Molecular evolutionary trends and feeding ecology diversification in the Hemiptera, anchored by the milkweed bug genome. Panfilio, K.A.*, Vargas Jentzsch, I.M., Benoit, J.B., Erezyilmaz, D., Suzuki, Y., Colella, S., Robertson, H.M., Poelchau, M.F., Waterhouse, R.M. Ioannidis, P. Weirauch, M.T., Hughes, D.S.T., Murali, S.C., Werren, J.H., Jacobs, G.C.G., Duncan, E.J., Armisén, D., Vreede, B.M.I., Baa-Puyoulet, P., Berger, C.S., Chang, C.-C., Chao, H., Chen, M.-J.M. , Chen, Y.-T., Childers, C.P., Chipman, A.D., Cridge, A.G., Crumire, A.J.J., Dearden, P.K., Didion, E.M., Dinh, H., Doddapaneni, H., Dolan, A., Dugan, S., Extavour, C.G., Febvay, G., Friedrich, M., Ginzburg, N., Han, Y., Heger, P., Horn, T., Hsiao, Y.-M., Jennings, E.C., Johnston, J.S., Jones, T.E. M., Jones, J.W., Khila, A., Koelzer, S., Kovacova, V., Leask, M., Lee, S.L., Lee, C.-Y.,Lovegrove, M.R., Lu, H.-L. Lu, Y. Moore, P.J., Munoz-Torres, M.C., Muzny, D.M., Palli, S.R., Parisot, N. Pick, L., Porter, M., Qu, J., Refki, P.N., Richter, R.,Rivera Pomar, R., Rosendale, A.J., Roth, S., Sachs, L., Santos, M.E., Seibert, J., Sghaier, E., Shukla, J.N.,Stancliffe, R.J., Tidswell, O., Traverso, L., van der Zee, M., Viala, S., Worley, K.C., Zdobnov, E.M., Gibbs, R.A., Richards, S.* Genome Biology, 20(1):64 (2019). [PubMed]
High-throughput live-imaging of embryos in microwell arrays using a modular specimen mounting system. Donoughe, S.D., Kim, C. and Extavour, C.G. Biology Open, 7(7):bio.031260 (2018). [PubMed]
The house spider genome reveals an ancient whole-genome duplication during arachnid evolution. Clarke, T., Schwager, E.E., Sharma, P.P., Wierschin, T., Pechmann, M., Akiyama-Oda, Y., Arensburger, P., Bucher, G., Buffry, A., Chao, H., Dinh, H., Doddapaneni, H., Dugan, S., Eibner, C., Extavour, C.G., Garb, J., Griffiths-Jones, S., Han, Y., Hayashi, C., Hilbrant, M., Hughes, D.S.T., Janssen, R., Lee, S.L., Leite, D.J., Murali, S.C., Muznym D.M., Nunes da Fonseca, R., Qu, J., Ronshaugen, M., Schomburg, C., Schönauer, A., Stollewerk, A., Torres-Oliva, M., Turetzek, N., Wolff, C., Worley, K.C., Gibbs, R.A., Coddington, J., Damen, W.G.M, Oda, H., Stanke, M., Ayoub, N., Prpic, N.-M., Posnien, N., Richards, S. and McGregor, A.P. BMC Biology, 15(1): 62 (2017). [PubMed]
The genome of Parhyale hawaiensis: a model for animal development regeneration, immunity and ligno-cellulose digestion. Kao, D., Lai, A., Stamataki, E., Rosic, S., Konstantinides, N., Jarvis, E., Di Donfrancesco, A., Pouchkina-Stancheva, N., Semon, M., Grillo, M., Bruce, H., Kumar, S., Siwanowicz, I., Le, A., Lemire, A., Extavour, C.G., Browne, W., Wolff, C., Averof, M., Patel, N.H., Sarkies, P., Pavlopoulos, A. and Aboobaker, A. eLife 5, e200629 (2016). [PubMed]
Editorial Overview: Developmental mechanisms, patterning and evolution: New models for genetics and development – diversity at last. Arendt, D. and Extavour, C.G. Current Opinion in Genetics and Development, 39 iv-vi (2016). [PubMed]
The significance and scope of evolutionary developmental biology: a vision for the 21st century. Moczek, A., Sears, K., Stollewerk, A., Wittkopp, P., Diggle, P., Dworkin, I., Ledon-Rettig, C., Matus, D., Roth, S., Abouheif, E., Brown, F. Chiu, C.-H., Cohen, C.S., De Tomaso, T., Gilbert, S., Hall, B., Love, A., Lyons, D., Sanger, T., Smith, J., Specht, C., Vallejo-Marin, M. and Extavour, C.G. Evolution and Development, 17(3): 198-219 (2015). [PubMed]
Embryonic development of the cricket Gryllus bimaculatus. Donoughe, S. and Extavour, C.G. Developmental Biology, 411(1): 140-156 (2015). [PubMed]
The first myriapod genome sequence reveals conservative arthropod gene content and genome organisation in the centipede Strigamia maritima. Chipman, A.D., Ferrier, D.E.K and the Strigamia maritima sequencing and annotation consortium (105 authors, including C. G. Extavour (#26) and T. Jones (#49)). PLoS Biology, 12(11): e1002005 (2014). [PubMed]
A comprehensive reference transcriptome resource for the common house spider Parasteatoda tepidariorum. Posnien, N., Zeng V., Schwager, E.E., Pechmann, M., Hilbrant, M., Keefe, J., Damen, W.G.M., Prpic-Schaper, N., McGregor, A.P. and Extavour, C.G. PLoS ONE, 9(8): e104885 (2014). [PubMed]