TY  - JOUR
TI  - Portuguese contributions to the discovery and characterization of the embryonic molecular clock 
AU  - Pascoal, Susana
AU  - Palmeirim, Isabel
T2  - The International Journal of Developmental Biology
AB  - Embryonic development is strictly regulated both in time and in space. This extraordinary control is clearly evidenced during the process of somitogenesis. In this process, pairs of somites are formed periodically, such that the time required to form a new somite pair is constant and species specific. The tight temporal control underlying somitogenesis has been shown to depend upon a molecular clock, manifested by the cyclic expression of an increasing number of genes in the unsegmented paraxial mesoderm. Portuguese researchers have been intimately connected to the achievements that have been made in this new field of research: the somitogenesis molecular clock. This article intends to report the Portuguese contributions to the discovery and characterization of the molecular clock underlying somite formation and possibly other embryonic processes. This work inspired many scientists around the world and it has been followed in Portugal by teams that keep on pursuing the characterization of the machinery of this molecular oscillator and its function in the acquisition of both temporal and positional information during development. 
PY  - 2009
DO  - 10.1387/ijdb.072285sp
VL  - 53
IS  - 8-9-10
SP  - 1421
EP  - 1426
J2  - Int. J. Dev. Biol.
LA  - en
SN  - 0214-6282
SN  - 1696-3547
UR  - https://ijdb.ehu.eus/article/072285sp
Y2  - 2024/05/05/00:04:20
ER  -