The cell behaviors associated with gastrulation in sea urchins have been well described. More recently, considerable progress has been made in elucidating gene regulatory networks (GRNs) that underlie the specification of early embryonic territories in this experimental model. This review integrates information from these two avenues of work. I discuss the principal cell movements that take place during sea urchin gastrulation, with an emphasis on molecular effectors of the movements, and summarize our current understanding of the gene regulatory circuitry upstream of those effectors. A case is made that GRN biology can provide a causal explanation of gastrulation, although additional analysis is needed at several levels of biological organization in order to provide a deeper understanding of this complex morphogenetic process.

中文翻译：

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海胆原肠胚形成的基因调控

与海胆原肠胚形成相关的细胞行为已经得到很好的描述。最近，在阐明作为该实验模型中早期胚胎区域规范基础的基因调控网络 (GRN) 方面取得了相当大的进展。该审查整合了来自这两种工作途径的信息。我讨论了海胆原肠胚形成过程中发生的主要细胞运动，重点是运动的分子效应子，并总结了我们目前对这些效应子上游基因调控回路的理解。一个例子是 GRN 生物学可以提供原肠胚形成的因果解释，尽管需要在生物组织的几个层次上进行额外的分析，以便更深入地了解这种复杂的形态发生过程。