BUTTERFLY WINGS - COLOR PATTERNS AND NOW GENE-EXPRESSION PATTERNS

The particular fascination of butterfly wings for developmental biolog ists (and others) lies in their spectacular array of colour patterns. The evolutionary and developmental relationships between these pattern s have been analysed and we know something of the cell interactions in volved in their formation((1)). Now butterfly homologues of Drosophila wing-patterning genes have been identified, and their expression patt erns offer the first clues to the molecular mechanisms which specify w ing colour patterns((2)).