Evolutionary adaptations of TRPA1 thermosensitivity and skin thermoregulation in vertebrates
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Skin pigmentation contributes to thermoregulation in ectothermic vertebrates, while homeotherms rely on insulation such as feathers, fur, or blubber. Heat-sensing in vertebrates largely depends on transient receptor potential (TRP) channels, with TRPA1 showing evolutionary shifts in sensitivity. The exploration of a role for TRP channels in skin physiology has largely focused on human pigmentation and overlooked the evolution of different thermoregulatory structures in the integument of distinct vertebrates. We investigated heat-induced skin darkening in the ectotherm Xenopus laevis and found TRPA1 mediates melanosome dispersion. Conversely, TRPA1 mediates cold sensation in rodents and UV-induced tanning in humans. In Euarchontoglires, a switch to TRPA1 cold thermal sensitivity correlates with a change in an essential amino acid (V→G878). Aquatic mammals (manatees, whales) that rely on blubber for insulation show reduced TRPA1 selection pressure as compared to their terrestrial relatives. Our findings highlight TRPA1’s adaptive evolution across vertebrates, linking thermal sensing to integumentary specialization.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame distilled prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.
Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one teacher head, not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".