This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MICIU/AEI/https://doi.org/10.13039/501100011033) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) “A way of making Europe” (European Union), Grant no. PID2019-103868RB-I00 (to J.C.) and PID2019-104483GB-I00 (to J.L.M.), and by the Agency for Management of University and Research Grants (Government of Catalonia) Grant 2021 SGR 00068 (to J.C.). A.R-A. was supported by a predoctoral contract from Spanish MICIU (PRE2020-092214). R.N.F. was supported by the University of Bergen (Norway). Institutional support to CNAG was from the Spanish MICIU and Generalitat de Catalunya through the Departament de Recerca i Universitats and Departament de Salut. The authors also acknowledge the “Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence” accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S) funded by the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI) https://doi.org/10.13039/501100011033, Peer reviewed

Extremophiles evolved capacities to survive extended exposure to harsh environmental conditions such as complete desiccation (anhydrobiosis) and freezing (cryobiosis). Accumulation of the three-carbon polyhydric alcohol glycerol is commonly observed in anhydrobiotic organisms, although it is considered to preferentially enhance cryobiosis rather than anhydrobiosis. Here, using dormant stages of the halophilic extremophile crustacean Artemia franciscana, we show that this role is reversed. We find that A. franciscana and related branchiopods evolved co-opted entomoglyceroporin (Eglp)-like aquaporin-type channels previously only characterized in hexapods. Phylogenomic and site-directed mutagenesis analyses indicate that EglpL orthologs likely evolved during the early Cambrian in the common ancestor of the Pancrustacea. RNAi-mediated knockdown experiments show that the A. franciscana EglpL glycerol transporter is subfunctionally co-regulated with canonical aquaglyceroporins (Glps) to mediate glycerol accumulation in the diapause cysts. Termination of diapause using either desiccation or hydrogen peroxide and further exposure of the cysts to freezing suggest that the acquired glycerol plays a more critical role in anhydrobiosis rather than cryobiosis. These findings uncover the essential role of evolutionary divergent aquaporin-type glycerol channels in the accrual of glycerol in an anhydrobiotic organism and reveal a previously overlooked function of this polyol for desiccation tolerance, Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MICIU/AEI/https://doi.org/10.13039/501100011033) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) “A way of making Europe” (European Union), Grant no. PID2019-103868RB-I00 (to J.C.) and PID2019-104483GB-I00 (to J.L.M.)
Agency for Management of University and Research Grants (Government of Catalonia) Grant 2021 SGR 00068 (to J.C.).
Spanish MICIU (PRE2020-092214).
University of Bergen (Norway).
Institutional support to CNAG was from the Spanish MICIU and Generalitat de Catalunya through the Departament de Recerca i Universitats and Departament de Salut.
“Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence” accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S) funded by the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI)https://doi.org/10.13039/501100011033, Raw Data (FASTQ files) from samples. Count and Normalized expression matrices. DNA sequences. ERX13367886 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367887 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367888 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367889 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367891 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367893 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367894 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13383215 GridION sequencing; ERX13383216 GridION sequencing; ERX13383217 GridION sequencing; ERX13367896 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367897 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367890 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367892 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing; ERX13367895 Illumina NovaSeq 6000 paired end sequencing, Peer reviewed

Supplementary Table S1. Oligonucleotide primers used for RT-qPCR.
Supplementary Table S2. Oligonucleotide primers used for dsRNA synthesis., This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MICIU/AEI/10.13039/501100011033) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) ‘A way of making Europe’ (European Union), grant no. PID2019-103868RB-I00 (to J.C.), and by the Agency for Management of University and Research Grants (Government of Catalonia) grant 2021 SGR 00068 (to J.C.). A.R.-A. was the recipient of a predoctoral contract from the Spanish MICIU (PRE2020-092214). R.N.F. was supported by the University of Bergen (Norway). The authors also acknowledge the ‘Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence’ accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S) funded by the Spanish Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI) 10.13039/501100011033, Peer reviewed

Data availability: Data are available in the article itself and its supplementary materials Chauvigné, François; Catalán-García, Marc; Daura, Xavier; Finn, Roderick N.; Cerdà, Joan. A pan-vertebrate signaling motif controls the molecular function of intracellular AQP12. Journal of Cell Biology 225(8): e202512040 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1083/jcb.202512040. The amino acid alignments and phylogenetic trees are available upon request, This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (MICIU/AEI/10.13039/501100011033) and the European Regional Development Fund “A way of making Europe” (European Union) (PID2019-103868RB-I00 to J. Cerdà), and by the Agency for Management of University and Research Grants (2021 SGR 00068 to J. Cerdà). R. N. Finn was supported by the University of Bergen (Norway). The authors acknowledge the “Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence” accreditation (CEX2024-001494-S) funded by the Spanish State Agency of Research (10.13039/501100011033), Peer reviewed