{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"institution":[{"name":"bioRxiv"}],"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,28]],"date-time":"2026-08-28T15:32:22Z","timestamp":1787931142628,"version":"build-2784847793"},"posted":{"date-parts":[[2023,12,23]]},"group-title":"Developmental Biology","reference-count":46,"publisher":"openRxiv","content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":[],"accepted":{"date-parts":[[2024,6,26]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>In vertebrate sexual development, two important steroid hormones, testosterone and estrogen, regu-late the sex-specific development of many tissues. In contrast, invertebrates utilize a single steroid hormone, ecdysone, to regulate developmental timing in both sexes. However, here we show that in Drosophila melanogaster, sex-specific ecdysone (E) signaling controls important aspects of gonad sexual dimorphism. Rather than being regulated at the level of hormone production, hor-mone activity is regulated cell-autonomously through sex-specific hormone reception. Ecdysone receptor (EcR) expression is restricted to the developing ovary and is repressed in the testis at a time when ecdysone initiates ovary morphogenesis. Interestingly, EcR expression is regulated downstream of the sex determination factor Doublesex (Dsx), the founding member of the Dsx\/Mab3 Related Transcription Factor (DMRT) family that regulates gonad development in all animals. E signaling is required for normal ovary development1,2, and ectopic activation of E sig-naling in the testis antagonized stem cell niche identity and feminized somatic support cells, which were transformed into follicle-like cells. This work demonstrates that invertebrates can also use steroid hormone signaling to control sex-specific development. Further, it may help explain recent work showing that vertebrate sexual development is surprisingly cell-autonomous. For example, chickens utilize testosterone and estrogen to control sex-specific development, but when they have a mixture of cells with male and female genotypes, the male cells develop as male and the female cells develop as female despite exposure to the same circulating hormones3. Sex-specific regulation of steroid hormone signaling may well underly such cell-autonomous sexual fate choices in verte-brates as it does in Drosophila.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1101\/2023.12.22.573099","type":"posted-content","created":{"date-parts":[[2023,12,23]],"date-time":"2023-12-23T19:55:10Z","timestamp":1703361310000},"source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":11,"title":["Steroid signaling controls sex-specific development in an invertebrate"],"prefix":"10.64898","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-5465-7401","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Lydia","family":"Grmai","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-7655-8412","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Erin","family":"Jimenez","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Kelly","family":"Baxter","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Mark","family":"Van Doren","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"54368","reference":[{"key":"2023122805200525000_2023.12.22.573099v1.1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.ydbio.2006.02.030"},{"key":"2023122805200525000_2023.12.22.573099v1.2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Camara, N. , Whitworth, C. , Dove, A. & Van Doren, M . 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