Establishment of the Axial Polarity and Cell Fate in Metazoa via Canonical Wnt Signaling: New Insights from Sponges and Annelids

In this paper, the role of the Wnt/β-catenin pathway in the establishment of the body plan in multicellular animals has been analyzed. We demonstrated that at different stages of development the Wnt signaling cascade is involved in several directly unrelated processes such as inner germ layer specification, anterior–posterior axis patterning, and terminal growth. Bioinformatics analysis revealed the independent divergence of Wnt ligands in basal...