Projects

Insect Sex Determination and Development

Molecular mechanism of an ancient non-coding sex determination locus

Digging to look for ant colonies from the field site — Getting ant colonies from the field site in Cassis, France.

© Miya Pan

Getting ant colonies from the field site in Cassis, France.

© Miya Pan

We investigate the molecular basis of an ancient sex determination locus in ants, where an unusual mechanism where allelic complementarity at a non-coding locus regulates the expression of a long non-coding RNA. Using molecular, genomic, and functional approaches, we explore how this RNA is regulated, how it influences developmental fate and how non-coding elements can evolve as key regulators of developmental processes.

Evolutionary origin of new sex determination mechanism

Argentine ant queens in a petri dish, with a few workers and a lot of eggs for microinjection.

© Miya Pan

Argentine ant queens in a petri dish, with a few workers and a lot of eggs for microinjection.

© Miya Pan

Integrating comparative genomics with phylogenetic, regulatory, and developmental analyses, we investigate how different molecular mechanisms of sex determination originate and transition, and which developmental innovations accompany these changes across haplodiploid lineages such as ants, wasps, and beetles.