Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Genomics

Return of a little squirt

Nature volume 420, pages 755–756 (2002)Cite this article

The draft sequence of the genome of a dim and distant relation of vertebrates will allow closer inspection of vertebrate origins. Some people have been waiting more than a hundred years for this.

The sea squirt Ciona intestinalis is an unassuming creature whose wider significance lies largely in its ancestry: it is a deuterostome, a member of the great group of multicellular animals that also includes the vertebrates, and so ourselves. The draft sequence of its genome, published last week in Science1, promises to shed light on the evolutionary origins of vertebrates and their relationships with other creatures.

Your institute does not have access to this article

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Figure 1

LAWSON WOOD/CORBIS

References

  1. Dehal, P. et al. Science 298, 2157–2167 (2002).

    ADS  CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Bateson, W. Materials for the Study of Variation (Macmillan, London, 1894).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Author notes

  1. Henry Gee is a senior editor at Nature.

    • Henry Gee
Authors
  1. Henry Gee
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Gee, H. Return of a little squirt. Nature 420, 755–756 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1038/420755a

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/420755a

Further reading

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing