[Curr Opin Genet Dev.]Evolution of sexual development and sexual dimorphism in insects

Evolution of sexual development and sexual dimorphism in insects Curr Opin Genet Dev. 2021 Apr 10;69:129-139. doi: 10.1016/j.gde.2021.02.011. Online ahead of print. Authors Ben R Hopkins 1 , Artyom Kopp 2 Affiliations 1 Department of Evolution and Ecology, University of California, One Shields Ave, Davis, CA, 95616, USA. Electronic address: brhopkins@ucdavis.edu. 2 Department of Evolution and Ecology, University of California, One Shields Ave, Davis, CA, 95616, USA. PMID: 33848958 DOI: 10.1016/j.gde.2021.02.011 Abstract Most animal species consist of two distinct sexes. At the morphological, physiological, and behavioral levels the differences between males and females are numerous and dramatic, yet at the genomic level they are often slight or absent. This disconnect is overcome because simple genetic differences or environmental signals are able to direct the sex-specific expression of a shared genome. A canonical picture of how this process works in insects emerged from decades of work on Drosophila. But recent years have seen an explosion of molecular-genetic and developmental work on a broad range of insects. Drawing these studies together, we describe the evolution of sexual dimorphism from a comparative perspective and argue that insect sex determination and differentiation systems are composites of rapidly evolving and highly conserved elements. Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.