New FWF Project: Evolution of the mammalian maternal- fetal interface

08.06.2020

Mihaela Pavlicev

Unit for Theoretical Biology
Department of Evolutionary Biology

Project number: P 33540 Einzelprojekte

Abstract

In spite of being key innovations of therian mammals, pregnancy and placentation are also some of their most variable characteristics. An important dimension of variation is the degree to which placenta invades maternal tissue. Invasive placentation evolved essentially concurrently with the evolution of implantation in the stem lineage of eutherian mammals and was only subsequently followed by independent evolution to noninvasive placentation in several eutherian lineages. The degree of invasiveness is a result of negotiation between fetal and maternal cells during early pregnancy, with maternal cells playing no lesser role then fetal cells in promoting and controlling the invasion. While comparative genomics identified many candidate genes involved in the crucial changes of invasiveness, the type of involvement remains unclear. To understand how the maternal-fetal communication develops and, in particular, evolves, we will conduct a comparative analysis of the interaction-network between the maternal and fetal cells across several therian species. The species are chosen to be most informative about the transitions of placental invasiveness: gray-tailed opossum (non-invasive), 9-banded armadillo (early invasive), two invasive rodents: guinea pig and mouse, and finally cow with secondarily evolved noninvasive placentation. We will take advantage of single-cell high throughput technology to address these questions.