Article ID: CBB001221540

Morphogenesis, Dictyostelium, and the Search for Shared Developmental Processes (2011)

unapi

In the 1930s John Tyler Bonner began studying the slime mold, Dictyostelium discoideum, as a way to investigate how organisms develop. With a life cycle that includes periods of unicellularity and multicellularity, Dictyostelium raises questions fundamental to development and evolution. In Morphogenesis: An Essay on Development (1952), Bonner built on his work with Dictyostelium to inform developmental theory and practice. By exploring how Bonner's early work with Dictyostelium motivated his synthetic approach in Morphogenesis, this paper presents an example of how those who studied development sought ways to gain traction in the rapidly changing life sciences. While a biochemical viewpoint of development became dominant, morphogenesis provided a way to reintroduce and emphasize biological organization at the organismal level. Bonner's early work offers a window to mid-twentieth century studies of development, an understudied area in the history of science, and shows that it was a time when growing experimental evidence enabled new ways of thinking about the relationship between ontogeny and evolution, and more broadly, about how the parts of nature might fit together.

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Authors & Contributors
Fasolo, Aldo
Lovisolo, Davide
Merlin, Francesca
Minelli, Alessandro
Nicoglou, Antonine
Ziche, Paul
Concepts
Developmental biology
Evolutionary developmental biology
Embryology
Biology
Morphology
Evolution
Time Periods
20th century, early
20th century
19th century
21st century
20th century, late
Places
Spain
Germany
Institutions
Università di Roma
Junta para Ampliación de Estudios e Investigaciones Científicas (Spain)
Human Genome Project
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