PhD Student
Supervisor: Brian Metscher

Unit for Theoretical Biology, Department of Evolutionary Biology
University of Vienna

Abstract

The vertebrate heart, with its striking variability across species, exemplifies how evolutionary innovations arise to meet changing environmental and physiological demands. Particularly phylogenetically recent modifications to the cardiac outflow tract (OFT), a  structure critical for separating pulmonary and systemic circulation, has enabled key macroevolutionary transitions. Yet, this same evolutionary novelty appears to be a site of vulnerability in humans, as most congenital heart diseases involve OFT malformations. Interestingly, altered cardiac phenotypes in humans often resemble normal heart anatomies in other vertebrates, suggesting a deep evolutionary connection between development and disease.

In this talk, I explore how environmental factors—such as oxygen availability—serve as developmental triggers that shape the heart’s structure and function. Using experimental manipulations of oxygen levels in chick embryos, I investigate how the same mechanisms that enabled the evolution of the vertebrate double-circulatory system may also predispose it to malformations. By bridging developmental and evolutionary biology, this work sheds light on how vertebrate diversity can provide insights into the origins of human congenital disorders.