show Abstracthide AbstractThe aim of this study is to identify a set of eye-specific genes across Drosophila species. Species are used as replicates to remove biological noise and identify a core set of conserved eye-developmental genes. We analyze this conserved core using the motif discovery tool i-cisTarget, and identify master regulators of retinal determination, including the Zinc Finger transcription factor Glass. Overall design: Six samples were analyzed by Illumina Digital Gene Expression (DGE) using the NlaIII restriction enzyme, namely two different tissues (eye-antennal discs and wing discs) for each of the three species under study.