Scientists Find Enzyme that Can Grow Eyes

Scientists at The University of Warwick in the UK were looking for one thing and found something entirely different. They were engaged in research to see if the release of ATP which is a molecule that is important for signaling and carrying energy, would have an influence on how frogs move. They inserted molecules known as ectoenzymes, which exist on the outside of cells, into frog embryos at the every earliest stage in their development. They used three different ectoenzymes E-NTPDase1, E-NTPDase2 and E-NTPDase3, all of which degrade ATP, but in different ways

They lost their interest in the movement study when they saw that E-NTPDase2 was having a dramatic effect on the eye development in the tadpoles who had grown from the embryos. When they introduced it into cells that would eventually become the head of the tadpole, it appeared to create multiple eyes. Not only that, when they introduced it into different cells that are destined to form other parts of the tadpole, it still produced additional eyes which led to tadpoles having eyes in their sides, abdomen and on their tails.

E-NTPDase2 works by quickly attaching itself to ATP thereby transforming it into ADP, Ammonium dihydrogen phosphate, and the nearby cells developed much higher levels of ADP. When ATP is release in s short burst from the place where an eye will develop it can be converted to ADP by E-NTPDase2, and this becomes a trigger for eye development.

The genes that are involved in eye development have been well known for a long time and are called the Eye Field Transcription Factors" (EFTFs). But what has not been known is how the genes get turned on in the exact right place and the exact right time and start the development of the eye.
The Warwick research found that this short burst of ATP and the resultant increase if ADP is one of the key signals for expression of EFTFs, which leads to the development of the eye

Mutations of the E-NTPDase2 gene, which occur on the human 9th chromosome are known to cause eye defects.