home news faculty undergraduate graduate staff seminars resources & links history intranet giving alumni

email:  djacobs@ucla.edu
phone:  (310) 206-7885
office:  LS 5127B
lab:  

research interests:   Evolution/Development of Invertebrate Body Plans, Paleobiology and Marine Speciation

Research Interests

The Jacobs lab takes a synthetic approach to reconstructing evolutionary history. Studies combine information from the fossil record, or large-scale physical process, with molecular approaches.

Our recent studies of molecular rates assess why molecular and fossil data appear to be in conflict about the timing of the Cambrian radiation. Other studies in the lab use molecular aspects of development to address issues of the origin of skeletons, a critical issue in the Cambrian radiation, and we are recovering and studying the expression of sense-organ development genes in basal animals such as jellyfish and sponges to better understand the evolution of our senses - a critical issue in the evolution of our animal nature.

Other work in the lab examines how global-scale changes in physical process control the evolution of biodiversity. For example, in a recent synthesis we combine molecular phylogenies and fossil data to document that the diverse marine fauna of the California coast is not a product of present conditions, but a relict of a spike in upwelling and productivity that lasted from 12 to 5 million years ago. Other projects in this area involve the evolution of the deep-sea and hot-vent faunas and detailed work on speciation process, and the discovery of cryptic species only resolvable by molecular means, in the estuaries of California and the Gulf of California.

Selected Publications

Davis, G., Dietrich, M. Jacobs, D.. 2009. Homeotic Mutants and the Assimilation of Developmental Genetics Into the Evolutionary Synthesis, 1915-1952 Descended from Darwin: Insights into American Evolutionary Studies, 1925-1950 American Philosophical SocietyPhiladelphia, PA 133-154 .

Nakanishi, N., Yuan, D., Jacobs, D.K., Hartenstein V.. 2008. Early development, pattern and reorganization of the planula nervous system in Aurelia (Cnidaria, Scyphozoa) Development Genes & Evolution 218: 511-524 .

Yuan, D., Nakanishi, N., Jacobs, D. K., Hartenstein. 2008. Embryonic development and metamorphosis of the scyphozoan Aurelia Development Genes & Evolution Development Genes & Evolution 218: 525-539 .

Jacobs, D.K., Nakanishi, N., Yuan, D., Camara, A. Nichols, S.A. & Hartenstein, V.. 2007. Evolution of sensory structures in Basal Metazoa Integrative and Comparative Biology 47: 712-723 .

Brown, D.M., Brenneman, R.A., Koepfli, K., Pollinger, J.P., Mila, B., Georgiadis, N. J. Louis, E. E., Grether, G. F., Jacobs D. K. & Wayne R. K.. 2007. Extensive population genetic structure in the giraffe Integrative and Comparative Biology BMC Biology 5: 1-13 .

Morris, J., Ladurner, P., Rieger, R., De Miguel-Bonet, M. D., Jacobs, D. & Hartenstein, V.. 2006. The Macrostomum lignano EST database as a molecular resource for studying platyhelminth development and phylogeny Integrative and Comparative Biology Development Genes & Evolution 216: 695-707 .

Hughes, N.C. & D.K. Jacobs. 2005. The end of everything: metazoan terminal addition Integrative and Comparative Biology 7: 497 .

Jacobs, D.K., N.C. Hughes, S.T. Fitz-Gibbon & C.J. Winchell. 2005. Terminal addition, the Cambrian Radiation and the Phanerozoic evolution of bilaterian form Evolution and Development 7: 498-514 .

Bebenek, I.G., R.D. Gates, J. Morris, V. Hartenstein & D.K Jacobs. 2004. Sine oculis in the Basal Metazoa Development, Genes & Evolution 214: 242-251 .

Jacobs, D.K., T.A. Haney & K.D. Louie. 2004. Genes, Diversity and Geologic Process of the Pacific Coast Annual Review of Earth & Planetery Science 32: 601-652 .