↓ Skip to main content

Flight feather development: its early specialization during embryogenesis

Overview of attention for article published in Zoological Letters, January 2018
Altmetric Badge

About this Attention Score

  • In the top 25% of all research outputs scored by Altmetric
  • Among the highest-scoring outputs from this source (#30 of 170)
  • High Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age (89th percentile)
  • Good Attention Score compared to outputs of the same age and source (66th percentile)

Mentioned by

blogs
1 blog
twitter
15 X users
wikipedia
1 Wikipedia page

Citations

dimensions_citation
11 Dimensions

Readers on

mendeley
57 Mendeley
You are seeing a free-to-access but limited selection of the activity Altmetric has collected about this research output. Click here to find out more.
Title
Flight feather development: its early specialization during embryogenesis
Published in
Zoological Letters, January 2018
DOI 10.1186/s40851-017-0085-4
Pubmed ID
Authors

Mao Kondo, Tomoe Sekine, Taku Miyakoshi, Keiichi Kitajima, Shiro Egawa, Ryohei Seki, Gembu Abe, Koji Tamura

Abstract

Flight feathers, a type of feather that is unique to extant/extinct birds and some non-avian dinosaurs, are the most evolutionally advanced type of feather. In general, feather types are formed in the second or later generation of feathers at the first and following molting, and the first molting begins at around two weeks post hatching in chicken. However, it has been stated in some previous reports that the first molting from the natal down feathers to the flight feathers is much earlier than that for other feather types, suggesting that flight feather formation starts as an embryonic event. The aim of this study was to determine the inception of flight feather morphogenesis and to identify embryological processes specific to flight feathers in contrast to those of down feathers. We found that the second generation of feather that shows a flight feather-type arrangement has already started developing by chick embryonic day 18, deep in the skin of the flight feather-forming region. This was confirmed by shh gene expression that shows barb pattern, and the expression pattern revealed that the second generation of feather development in the flight feather-forming region seems to start by embryonic day 14. The first stage at which we detected a specific morphology of the feather bud in the flight feather-forming region was embryonic day 11, when internal invagination of the feather bud starts, while the external morphology of the feather bud is radial down-type. The morphogenesis for the flight feather, the most advanced type of feather, has been drastically modified from the beginning of feather morphogenesis, suggesting that early modification of the embryonic morphogenetic process may have played a crucial role in the morphological evolution of this key innovation. Co-optation of molecular cues for axial morphogenesis in limb skeletal development may be able to modify morphogenesis of the feather bud, giving rise to flight feather-specific morphogenesis of traits.

X Demographics

X Demographics

The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 15 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 57 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Unknown 57 100%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Bachelor 9 16%
Student > Ph. D. Student 8 14%
Student > Master 6 11%
Researcher 5 9%
Student > Doctoral Student 3 5%
Other 5 9%
Unknown 21 37%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Agricultural and Biological Sciences 17 30%
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology 6 11%
Earth and Planetary Sciences 5 9%
Arts and Humanities 1 2%
Environmental Science 1 2%
Other 5 9%
Unknown 22 39%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 18. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 04 December 2022.
All research outputs
#1,804,766
of 23,269,984 outputs
Outputs from Zoological Letters
#30
of 170 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#44,808
of 443,456 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Zoological Letters
#2
of 6 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 23,269,984 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 92nd percentile: it's in the top 10% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 170 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 16.8. This one has done well, scoring higher than 82% of its peers.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 443,456 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has done well, scoring higher than 89% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 6 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has scored higher than 4 of them.