600 mya. From ScienceDaily:
Cells need to ‘know’ where they are in relation to all other cells in order to give rise into the correct cell types and tissues. The so-called ‘organizer’ is responsible for the formation of these body axes. Developmental biologists have shown that the molecular principles of the organizer are much more ancient than previously thought. The same signals were used already in the common ancestor of sea anemones and vertebrates 600 million years ago.
…
In vertebrate early development, an “organizer” forms in the region of the primitive mouth (the blastopore) of the embryo. This organizer is responsible for guiding axis formation of the organism. Its discovery won Hans Spemann a Nobel Prize in 1935. The organizer tissue instructs the surrounding cells to take part in body axes development, enforcing a certain developmental fate on them. Without an organizer, the embryo would not know where the head, the tail, the back and the belly should be. Mistakes in the regulation of body axes can lead to severe developmental defects, for example to the formation of Siamese twins.
In the last 25 years, the researchers largely elucidated the genetic underpinnings of this very particular part of the vertebrate embryo. The widespread assumption was that the organizer was a specific vertebrate feature, since it was not readily observable in insect or worm embryos. Paper. (public access) – Yulia Kraus, Andy Aman, Ulrich Technau, Grigory Genikhovich. Pre-bilaterian origin of the blastoporal axial organizer. Nature Communications, 2016; 7: 11694 DOI: 10.1038/ncomms11694 More.
But it turns out the molecular underpinnings from 600 mya were in them too. It looks far more like a pattern than like random evolution. Michael Denton is right.
See also: Michael Denton on the discontinuity of nature
and
Stasis: Life goes on but evolution does not happen
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