Here is an interesting story on the publication of the discovery of the first hagfish sex hormone. Is this hormone ancestral to vertebrates or derived within the hagfish? I guess you'll have to read the referred paper.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/10/101005171038.htm
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I must not know enough about hagfish biology to get what is surprising about this. Are there any known vertebrates that don't have some form of sex hormones?
ReplyDeleteI see your point and don't think there are any vertebrates without sex hormones. I think what makes this interesting is that hagfish are basal and so it might suggest that the basic vertebrate sex hormones have a single origin. Of course this origin would be in something ancestral to the hagfish.
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