FGF signaling during gastrulation.

Sivak, J. M. and Amaya, E.

in Gastrulation. Edited by Claudio Stern. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press. (2004). in press.

Introduction

The induction, maintenance and patterning of the mesoderm and neural ectoderm occur around the time of

gastrulation, in response to the positive and negative influences of a handful of growth factor signals.

Among these signals are members of the fibroblast growth factor (FGF) family. A role for this family of

growth factors in early vertebrate development was first suggested in the late 1980's when it was

demonstrated that purified mammalian FGF was able to induce mesoderm in competent animal cap tissue,

normally fated to become epidermis in Xenopus (Slack et al., 1987) (Kimelman and Kirschner, 1987). Prior

to these experiments, the molecular nature of inducing molecules in vertebrate development had been

elusive, despite efforts to purify these factors over several decades. For this reason, the description of the

inducing capacity of purified FGF in animal caps received much attention and could be credited for much

of the great resurgence in the study of inducing factors in embryogenesis over the past 15 years.

Although initially described as mesoderm inducing factors, members of the FGF family members have

subsequently been shown to take part in many other events during early development. In this chapter we

present an overview of the modes of FGF action and will review work suggesting a role for this family of

growth factors in mesoderm formation, the coordination of cell movements, induction of the nervous system

and anterior-posterior patterning of the embryo. Finally we discuss the emerging issues and unanswered

questions that need to be addressed in order to achieve a more complete understanding of how FGF

signaling accomplishes its multiple roles in the embryo.

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