Mity model: Tetranychus urticae, a candidate for chelicerate model organism.

Chelicerates (scorpions, horseshoe crabs, spiders, mites and ticks) are the second largest group of arthropods and are of immense importance for fundamental and applied science. They occupy a basal phylogenetic position within the phylum Arthropoda, and are of crucial significance for understanding the evolution of various arthropod lineages. Chelicerates are vectors of human diseases, such as ticks, and major agricultural pests, such as spider mites, thus this group is also of importance for both medicine and agriculture. The developmental genetics of chelicerates is poorly understood and a challenge for the future progress for many aspects of chelicerate biology is the development of a model organism for this group. Toward this end, we are developing a chelicerate genetic model: the two-spotted spider mite Tetranychus urticae. T. urticae has the smallest genome of any arthropod determined so far (75 Mbp, 60% of the size of the Drosophila genome), undergoes rapid development and is easy to maintain in the laboratory. These features make T. urticae a promising reference organism for the economically important, poorly studied and species-rich chelicerate lineage.

[1]  M. Grbic,et al.  Gene silencing in the spider mite Tetranychus urticae: dsRNA and siRNA parental silencing of the Distal-less gene , 2007, Development Genes and Evolution.

[2]  V. Nene,et al.  Sequencing a New Target Genome: The Boophilus microplus (Acari: Ixodidae) Genome Project , 2006, Journal of medical entomology.

[3]  Ekat Kritikou,et al.  Cell signalling: Divided divisions , 2005, Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology.

[4]  Ariel D. Chipman,et al.  Arthropod Segmentation: beyond the Drosophila paradigm , 2005, Nature Reviews Genetics.

[5]  R. Janssen,et al.  Pair rule gene orthologs in spider segmentation , 2005, Evolution & development.

[6]  A. Aharoni,et al.  Genetic Engineering of Terpenoid Metabolism Attracts Bodyguards to Arabidopsis , 2005, Science.

[7]  C. Hill,et al.  The Ixodes scapularis Genome Project: an opportunity for advancing tick research. , 2005, Trends in parasitology.

[8]  F. Guerrero,et al.  Genome size and organization in the blacklegged tick, Ixodes scapularis and the Southern cattle tick, Boophilus microplus , 2005, Insect molecular biology.

[9]  M. Schoppmeier,et al.  Expression of Pax group III genes suggests a single‐segmental periodicity for opisthosomal segment patterning in the spider Cupiennius salei , 2005, Evolution & development.

[10]  Philippe Reymond,et al.  A Conserved Transcript Pattern in Response to a Specialist and a Generalist Herbivorew⃞ , 2004, The Plant Cell Online.

[11]  T. Tuschl,et al.  Mechanisms of gene silencing by double-stranded RNA , 2004, Nature.

[12]  M. Dicke,et al.  Indirect defence of plants against herbivores: using Arabidopsis thaliana as a model plant. , 2004, Plant biology.

[13]  R. ffrench-Constant,et al.  The genetics and genomics of insecticide resistance. , 2004, Trends in genetics : TIG.

[14]  R. Britten,et al.  DNA sequence organization in the genomes of five marine invertebrates , 1975, Chromosoma.

[15]  T. Gregory,et al.  Genome sizes of spiders. , 2003, The Journal of heredity.

[16]  Michael Schoppmeier,et al.  Involvement of Notch and Delta genes in spider segmentation , 2003, Nature.

[17]  J. Oakeshott,et al.  The genomics of insecticide resistance , 2003, Genome Biology.

[18]  L. Arlian.  Arthropod allergens and human health. , 2003, Annual review of entomology.

[19]  P. Dearden,et al.  Expression of pair-rule gene homologues in a chelicerate: early patterning of the two-spotted spider mite Tetranychus urticae , 2002, Development.

[20]  Yong-Lak Park,et al.  Leaf cell and tissue damage of cucumber caused by twospotted spider mite (Acari: Tetranychidae). , 2002, Journal of economic entomology.

[21]  J. Cornuet,et al.  Genetic structure of a greenhouse population of the spider mite Tetranychus urticae: spatio‐temporal analysis with microsatellite markers , 2002, Insect molecular biology.

[22]  P. Dearden,et al.  Vasa expression and germ-cell specification in the spider mite Tetranychus urticae , 2002, Development Genes and Evolution.

[23]  T. Platts-Mills,et al.  The biology of dust mites and the remediation of mite allergens in allergic disease. , 2001, The Journal of allergy and clinical immunology.

[24]  D. Tautz,et al.  Expression patterns of hairy, even-skipped, and runt in the spider Cupiennius salei imply that these genes were segmentation genes in a basal arthropod. , 2000, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[25]  M. Kaeberlein,et al.  A genetic screen for zygotic embryonic lethal mutations affecting cuticular morphology in the wasp Nasonia vitripennis. , 2000, Genetics.

[26]  M. Navajas,et al.  Microsatellite sequences are under‐represented in two mite genomes , 1998, Insect molecular biology.

[27]  Jeffrey L. Boore,et al.  Gene translocation links insects and crustaceans , 1998, Nature.

[28]  D. Tautz,et al.  Ribosomal DNA phylogeny of the major extant arthropod classes and the evolution of myriapods , 1995, Nature.

[29]  Timothy M. Collins,et al.  Deducing the pattern of arthropod phytogeny from mitochondrial DNA rearrangements , 1995, Nature.

[30]  M. Hoy,et al.  Stable genetic transformation of a beneficial arthropod, Metaseiulus occidentalis (Acari: Phytoseiidae), by a microinjection technique. , 1992, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[31]  C. Nüsslein-Volhard,et al.  The origin of pattern and polarity in the Drosophila embryo , 1992, Cell.

[32]  T. Itow,et al.  Induction of Secondary Embryos by Intra‐ and Interspecific Grafts of Center Cells under the blastopore in Horseshoe Crabs , 1991, Development, growth & differentiation.

[33]  J. Kukalová-Peck,et al.  The ecology of Paleozoic terrestrial arthropods: the fossil evidence , 1990 .

[34]  J. Oliver.  Parthenogenesis in Mites and Ticks (Arachnida: Acari) , 1971 .