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Title: A simple developmental model recapitulates complex insect wing venation patterns

Abstract

Insect wings are typically supported by thickened struts called veins. These veins form diverse geometric patterns across insects. For many insect species, even the left and right wings from the same individual have veins with unique topological arrangements, and little is known about how these patterns form. We present a large-scale quantitative study of the fingerprint-like “secondary veins.” We compile a dataset of wings from 232 species and 17 families from the order Odonata (dragonflies and damselflies), a group with particularly elaborate vein patterns. We characterize the geometric arrangements of veins and develop a simple model of secondary vein patterning. We show that our model is capable of recapitulating the vein geometries of species from other, distantly related winged insect clades.

Authors:
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4]; ORCiD logo [5]
  1. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138,
  2. Department of Molecular Genetics and Cell Biology, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637,
  3. Applied Physics and Applied Mathematics Department, Columbia University, New York, NY 10027,
  4. Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138,
  5. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138,, Computational Research Division, Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Science (SC)
OSTI Identifier:
1471162
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1526542
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC02-05CH11231
Resource Type:
Published Article
Journal Name:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Name: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Journal Volume: 115 Journal Issue: 40; Journal ID: ISSN 0027-8424
Publisher:
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES; insect wings; patterning; image segmentation; computational modeling; Odonata

Citation Formats

Hoffmann, Jordan, Donoughe, Seth, Li, Kathy, Salcedo, Mary K., and Rycroft, Chris H. A simple developmental model recapitulates complex insect wing venation patterns. United States: N. p., 2018. Web. doi:10.1073/pnas.1721248115.
Hoffmann, Jordan, Donoughe, Seth, Li, Kathy, Salcedo, Mary K., & Rycroft, Chris H. A simple developmental model recapitulates complex insect wing venation patterns. United States. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1721248115
Hoffmann, Jordan, Donoughe, Seth, Li, Kathy, Salcedo, Mary K., and Rycroft, Chris H. Mon . "A simple developmental model recapitulates complex insect wing venation patterns". United States. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1721248115.
@article{osti_1471162,
title = {A simple developmental model recapitulates complex insect wing venation patterns},
author = {Hoffmann, Jordan and Donoughe, Seth and Li, Kathy and Salcedo, Mary K. and Rycroft, Chris H.},
abstractNote = {Insect wings are typically supported by thickened struts called veins. These veins form diverse geometric patterns across insects. For many insect species, even the left and right wings from the same individual have veins with unique topological arrangements, and little is known about how these patterns form. We present a large-scale quantitative study of the fingerprint-like “secondary veins.” We compile a dataset of wings from 232 species and 17 families from the order Odonata (dragonflies and damselflies), a group with particularly elaborate vein patterns. We characterize the geometric arrangements of veins and develop a simple model of secondary vein patterning. We show that our model is capable of recapitulating the vein geometries of species from other, distantly related winged insect clades.},
doi = {10.1073/pnas.1721248115},
journal = {Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America},
number = 40,
volume = 115,
place = {United States},
year = {Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 EDT 2018},
month = {Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 EDT 2018}
}

Journal Article:
Free Publicly Available Full Text
Publisher's Version of Record
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1721248115

Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 22 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

Figures / Tables:

Fig. 1 Fig. 1: Secondary veins form a unique pattern on every wing. (A) Overlay of the left (blue) and right (orange) forewing of the same individual of Erythremis simplicicolis. (B) Left and right wings of the same individual, with domains colored by circularity and area. Left wings have been reflected formore » display. (C) Area and circularity of each vein domain. Each point represents a single domain (blue points, left wing; orange points, right wing).« less

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Figures/Tables have been extracted from DOE-funded journal article accepted manuscripts.