Deer antler: a unique model for studying mammalian organ morphogenesis
Zhao Haiping A , Chu Wenhui A , Liu Zhen A and Li Chunyi A B
+ Author Affiliations
- Author Affiliations
A State Key Laboratory for Molecular Biology of Special Economic Animals, Institute of Special Wild Economic Animals and Plants, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Changchun, 130112, China.
B Corresponding author. Email: lichunyi1959@163.com
Animal Production Science 56(6) 946-952 https://doi.org/10.1071/AN14902
Submitted: 24 October 2014 Accepted: 10 March 2015 Published: 16 June 2015
Abstract
It is now widely accepted that organ morphogenesis in the lower animals, such as amphibians, is encoded by bioelectricity. Whether this finding applies to mammals is not known, a situation which is at least partially caused by the lack of suitable models. Deer antlers are complex mammalian organs, and their morphogenetic information resides in a primordium, the periosteum overlying the frontal crest of a prepubertal deer. The present paper reviews (1) the influence of morphogenetic information on antler formation and regeneration, and proposes that antlers are an appropriate organ for studying mammalian organ morphogenesis and (2) the storage, duplication and transferring pathways of morphogenetic information for deer antlers, and outlines a preliminary idea about how to understand the morphogenesis of mammalian organs through an involvement of bioelectricity. We believe that findings made using the deer antler model will benefit human health and wellbeing.
Additional keywords: antlerogenic periosteum, bioelectric code, pedicle periosteum, regeneration.
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