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Wang X, Guo Z, Dai D, Xie C, Zhao Z, Zheng J, Sun M, Peng D. High-resolution transcriptome datasets during embryogenesis of plant-parasitic nematodes. Sci Data 2024; 11:690. [PMID: 38926436 PMCID: PMC11208412 DOI: 10.1038/s41597-024-03542-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/25/2024] [Accepted: 06/17/2024] [Indexed: 06/28/2024] Open
Abstract
Understanding the transcriptional regulatory characteristics throughout the embryogenesis of plant-parasitic nematodes is crucial for elucidating their developmental processes' uniqueness. However, a challenge arises due to the lack of suitable technical methods for synchronizing the age of plant-parasitic nematodes embryo, it is difficult to collect detailed transcriptome data at each stage of embryonic development. Here, we recorded the 11 embryonic developmental time-points of endophytic nematode Meloidogyne incognita (isolated from Wuhan, China), Heterodera glycines (isolated from Wuhan, China), and Ditylenchus destructor (isolated from Jinan, China) species, and constructed transcriptome datasets of single embryos of these three species utilizing low-input smart-seq2 technology. The datasets encompassed 11 complete embryonic development stages, including Zygote, 2-cell, 4-cell, 8-cell, 24-44 cell, 64-78 cell, Comma, 1.5-fold, 2-fold, Moving, and L1, each stage generated four to five replicates, resulting in a total of 162 high-resolution transcriptome libraries. This high-resolution cross-species dataset serves as a crucial resource for comprehending the embryonic developmental properties of plant-parasitic nematodes and for identifying functional regulatory genes during embryogenesis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Xueyu Wang
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
- College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
| | - Zhiqing Guo
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
- College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
| | - Dadong Dai
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
- College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
| | - Chuanshuai Xie
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
- College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
| | - Ziwei Zhao
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
- College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
| | - Jinshui Zheng
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
- Hubei Key Laboratory of Agricultural Bioinformatics, College of Informatics, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
| | - Ming Sun
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
- College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China
| | - Donghai Peng
- State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, Hubei Hongshan Laboratory, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China.
- College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, 430070, China.
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2
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Ma F, Zheng C. Single-cell phylotranscriptomics of developmental and cell type evolution. Trends Genet 2024; 40:495-510. [PMID: 38490933 DOI: 10.1016/j.tig.2024.02.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/23/2023] [Revised: 02/16/2024] [Accepted: 02/16/2024] [Indexed: 03/17/2024]
Abstract
Single-cell phylotranscriptomics is an emerging tool to reveal the molecular and cellular mechanisms of evolution. We summarize its utility in studying the hourglass pattern of ontogenetic evolution and for understanding the evolutionary history of cell types. The developmental hourglass model suggests that the mid-embryonic stage is the most conserved period of development across species, which is supported by morphological and molecular studies. Single-cell phylotranscriptomic analysis has revealed previously underappreciated heterogeneity in transcriptome ages among lineages and cell types throughout development, and has identified the lineages and tissues that drive the whole-organism hourglass pattern. Single-cell transcriptome age analyses also provide important insights into the origin of germ layers, the different selective forces on tissues during adaptation, and the evolutionary relationships between cell types.
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Affiliation(s)
- Fuqiang Ma
- School of Biological Sciences, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China
| | - Chaogu Zheng
- School of Biological Sciences, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong SAR, China.
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3
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Uchida Y, Tsutsumi M, Ichii S, Irie N, Furusawa C. Deciphering the origin of developmental stability: The role of intracellular expression variability in evolutionary conservation. Evol Dev 2024; 26:e12473. [PMID: 38414112 DOI: 10.1111/ede.12473] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/08/2023] [Revised: 12/01/2023] [Accepted: 02/14/2024] [Indexed: 02/29/2024]
Abstract
Progress in evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) has deepened our understanding of how intrinsic properties of embryogenesis, along with natural selection and population genetics, shape phenotypic diversity. A focal point of recent empirical and theoretical research is the idea that highly developmentally stable phenotypes are more conserved in evolution. Previously, we demonstrated that in Japanese medaka (Oryzias latipes), embryonic stages and genes with high stability, estimated through whole-embryo RNA-seq, are highly conserved in subsequent generations. However, the precise origin of the stability of gene expression levels evaluated at the whole-embryo level remained unclear. Such stability could be attributed to two distinct sources: stable intracellular expression levels or spatially stable expression patterns. Here we demonstrate that stability observed in whole-embryo RNA-seq can be attributed to stability at the cellular level (low variability in gene expression at the cellular levels). We quantified the intercellular variations in expression levels and spatial gene expression patterns for seven key genes involved in patterning dorsoventral and rostrocaudal regions during early development in medaka. We evaluated intracellular variability by counting transcripts and found its significant correlation with variation observed in whole-embryo RNA-seq data. Conversely, variation in spatial gene expression patterns, assessed through intraindividual left-right asymmetry, showed no correlation. Given the previously reported correlation between stability and conservation of expression levels throughout embryogenesis, our findings suggest a potential general trend: the stability or instability of developmental systems-and the consequent evolutionary diversity-may be primarily anchored in intrinsic fundamental elements such as the variability of intracellular states.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yui Uchida
- Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research, RIKEN, Osaka, Japan
| | - Masato Tsutsumi
- Graduate School of Integrated Sciences for Life, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, Japan
| | - Shunsuke Ichii
- Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research, RIKEN, Osaka, Japan
- Department of Physics, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Naoki Irie
- Research Center for Integrative Evolutionary Science, SOKENDAI, Kanagawa, Japan
| | - Chikara Furusawa
- Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research, RIKEN, Osaka, Japan
- Department of Physics, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
- Universal Biology Institute, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
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4
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Balogun EJ, Ness RW. The Effects of De Novo Mutation on Gene Expression and the Consequences for Fitness in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. Mol Biol Evol 2024; 41:msae035. [PMID: 38366781 PMCID: PMC10910851 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msae035] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/14/2023] [Revised: 02/01/2024] [Accepted: 02/13/2024] [Indexed: 02/18/2024] Open
Abstract
Mutation is the ultimate source of genetic variation, the bedrock of evolution. Yet, predicting the consequences of new mutations remains a challenge in biology. Gene expression provides a potential link between a genotype and its phenotype. But the variation in gene expression created by de novo mutation and the fitness consequences of mutational changes to expression remain relatively unexplored. Here, we investigate the effects of >2,600 de novo mutations on gene expression across the transcriptome of 28 mutation accumulation lines derived from 2 independent wild-type genotypes of the green algae Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. We observed that the amount of genetic variance in gene expression created by mutation (Vm) was similar to the variance that mutation generates in typical polygenic phenotypic traits and approximately 15-fold the variance seen in the limited species where Vm in gene expression has been estimated. Despite the clear effect of mutation on expression, we did not observe a simple additive effect of mutation on expression change, with no linear correlation between the total expression change and mutation count of individual MA lines. We therefore inferred the distribution of expression effects of new mutations to connect the number of mutations to the number of differentially expressed genes (DEGs). Our inferred DEE is highly L-shaped with 95% of mutations causing 0-1 DEG while the remaining 5% are spread over a long tail of large effect mutations that cause multiple genes to change expression. The distribution is consistent with many cis-acting mutation targets that affect the expression of only 1 gene and a large target of trans-acting targets that have the potential to affect tens or hundreds of genes. Further evidence for cis-acting mutations can be seen in the overabundance of mutations in or near differentially expressed genes. Supporting evidence for trans-acting mutations comes from a 15:1 ratio of DEGs to mutations and the clusters of DEGs in the co-expression network, indicative of shared regulatory architecture. Lastly, we show that there is a negative correlation with the extent of expression divergence from the ancestor and fitness, providing direct evidence of the deleterious effects of perturbing gene expression.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eniolaye J Balogun
- Department of Biology, William G. Davis Building, University of Toronto, Mississauga L5L-1C6, Canada
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Toronto, Toronto M5S-3B2, Canada
| | - Rob W Ness
- Department of Biology, William G. Davis Building, University of Toronto, Mississauga L5L-1C6, Canada
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5
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Kohsokabe T, Kuratanai S, Kaneko K. Developmental hourglass: Verification by numerical evolution and elucidation by dynamical-systems theory. PLoS Comput Biol 2024; 20:e1011867. [PMID: 38422161 PMCID: PMC10903806 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1011867] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/17/2023] [Accepted: 01/29/2024] [Indexed: 03/02/2024] Open
Abstract
Determining the general laws between evolution and development is a fundamental biological challenge. Developmental hourglasses have attracted increased attention as candidates for such laws, but the necessity of their emergence remains elusive. We conducted evolutionary simulations of developmental processes to confirm the emergence of the developmental hourglass and unveiled its establishment. We considered organisms consisting of cells containing identical gene networks that control morphogenesis and evolved them under selection pressure to induce more cell types. By computing the similarity between the spatial patterns of gene expression of two species that evolved from a common ancestor, a developmental hourglass was observed, that is, there was a correlation peak in the intermediate stage of development. The fraction of pleiotropic genes increased, whereas the variance in individuals decreased, consistent with previous experimental reports. Reduction of the unavoidable variance by initial or developmental noise, essential for survival, was achieved up to the hourglass bottleneck stage, followed by diversification in developmental processes, whose timing is controlled by the slow expression dynamics conserved among organisms sharing the hourglass. This study suggests why developmental hourglasses are observed within a certain phylogenetic range of species.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | - Kunihiko Kaneko
- Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
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6
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Pountain AW, Jiang P, Yao T, Homaee E, Guan Y, McDonald KJC, Podkowik M, Shopsin B, Torres VJ, Golding I, Yanai I. Transcription-replication interactions reveal bacterial genome regulation. Nature 2024; 626:661-669. [PMID: 38267581 PMCID: PMC10923101 DOI: 10.1038/s41586-023-06974-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/22/2023] [Accepted: 12/14/2023] [Indexed: 01/26/2024]
Abstract
Organisms determine the transcription rates of thousands of genes through a few modes of regulation that recur across the genome1. In bacteria, the relationship between the regulatory architecture of a gene and its expression is well understood for individual model gene circuits2,3. However, a broader perspective of these dynamics at the genome scale is lacking, in part because bacterial transcriptomics has hitherto captured only a static snapshot of expression averaged across millions of cells4. As a result, the full diversity of gene expression dynamics and their relation to regulatory architecture remains unknown. Here we present a novel genome-wide classification of regulatory modes based on the transcriptional response of each gene to its own replication, which we term the transcription-replication interaction profile (TRIP). Analysing single-bacterium RNA-sequencing data, we found that the response to the universal perturbation of chromosomal replication integrates biological regulatory factors with biophysical molecular events on the chromosome to reveal the local regulatory context of a gene. Whereas the TRIPs of many genes conform to a gene dosage-dependent pattern, others diverge in distinct ways, and this is shaped by factors such as intra-operon position and repression state. By revealing the underlying mechanistic drivers of gene expression heterogeneity, this work provides a quantitative, biophysical framework for modelling replication-dependent expression dynamics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrew W Pountain
- Institute for Systems Genetics, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA
| | - Peien Jiang
- Institute for Systems Genetics, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Biology, New York University, New York, NY, USA
| | - Tianyou Yao
- Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA
| | - Ehsan Homaee
- Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA
- Center for Biophysics and Computational Biology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA
| | - Yichao Guan
- Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA
| | - Kevin J C McDonald
- Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA
| | - Magdalena Podkowik
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA
| | - Bo Shopsin
- Department of Medicine, Division of Infectious Diseases, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Microbiology, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA
| | - Victor J Torres
- Department of Microbiology, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA
- Department of Host-Microbe Interactions, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, TN, USA
| | - Ido Golding
- Department of Physics, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA
- Department of Microbiology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, USA
| | - Itai Yanai
- Institute for Systems Genetics, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA.
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York, NY, USA.
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7
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Sémon M. Sex-biased gene expression in mammals. Science 2023; 382:515-516. [PMID: 37917704 DOI: 10.1126/science.adk9990] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/04/2023]
Abstract
Sex differences in gene expression start at puberty and vary across species and organs.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marie Sémon
- Laboratory of Biology and Modeling of the Cell, École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, CNRS UMR5239, Inserm U1293, University Claude Bernard Lyon 1, Lyon, France
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Rolland J, Henao-Diaz LF, Doebeli M, Germain R, Harmon LJ, Knowles LL, Liow LH, Mank JE, Machac A, Otto SP, Pennell M, Salamin N, Silvestro D, Sugawara M, Uyeda J, Wagner CE, Schluter D. Conceptual and empirical bridges between micro- and macroevolution. Nat Ecol Evol 2023; 7:1181-1193. [PMID: 37429904 DOI: 10.1038/s41559-023-02116-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/08/2022] [Accepted: 06/13/2023] [Indexed: 07/12/2023]
Abstract
Explaining broad molecular, phenotypic and species biodiversity patterns necessitates a unifying framework spanning multiple evolutionary scales. Here we argue that although substantial effort has been made to reconcile microevolution and macroevolution, much work remains to identify the links between biological processes at play. We highlight four major questions of evolutionary biology whose solutions require conceptual bridges between micro and macroevolution. We review potential avenues for future research to establish how mechanisms at one scale (drift, mutation, migration, selection) translate to processes at the other scale (speciation, extinction, biogeographic dispersal) and vice versa. We propose ways in which current comparative methods to infer molecular evolution, phenotypic evolution and species diversification could be improved to specifically address these questions. We conclude that researchers are in a better position than ever before to build a synthesis to understand how microevolutionary dynamics unfold over millions of years.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jonathan Rolland
- CNRS, UMR5174, Laboratoire Evolution et Diversité Biologique, Université Toulouse 3 Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France.
| | - L Francisco Henao-Diaz
- Department of Zoology, and Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Michael Doebeli
- Department of Zoology, and Department of Mathematics, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
| | - Rachel Germain
- Department of Zoology, and Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
| | - Luke J Harmon
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID, USA
| | - L Lacey Knowles
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Museum of Zoology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA
| | | | - Judith E Mank
- Department of Zoology, and Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
| | - Antonin Machac
- Department of Zoology, and Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
- Laboratory of Environmental Microbiology, Institute of Microbiology of the CAS, Prague, Czech Republic
| | - Sarah P Otto
- Department of Zoology, and Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
| | - Matt Pennell
- Departments of Quantitative and Computational Biology and Biological Sciences, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA
| | - Nicolas Salamin
- Department of Computational Biology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Daniele Silvestro
- Department of Biology, University of Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland
- Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
- Gothenburg Global Biodiversity Centre, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
| | - Mauro Sugawara
- Department of Zoology, and Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
- Mário Schenberg Institute, São Paulo, Brazil
| | - Josef Uyeda
- Department of Biological Sciences, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA, USA
| | - Catherine E Wagner
- Department of Botany, and Program in Ecology and Evolution, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY, USA
| | - Dolph Schluter
- Department of Zoology, and Biodiversity Research Centre, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
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Cutter AD. Speciation and development. Evol Dev 2023; 25:289-327. [PMID: 37545126 DOI: 10.1111/ede.12454] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/07/2023] [Revised: 06/13/2023] [Accepted: 07/20/2023] [Indexed: 08/08/2023]
Abstract
Understanding general principles about the origin of species remains one of the foundational challenges in evolutionary biology. The genomic divergence between groups of individuals can spawn hybrid inviability and hybrid sterility, which presents a tantalizing developmental problem. Divergent developmental programs may yield either conserved or divergent phenotypes relative to ancestral traits, both of which can be responsible for reproductive isolation during the speciation process. The genetic mechanisms of developmental evolution involve cis- and trans-acting gene regulatory change, protein-protein interactions, genetic network structures, dosage, and epigenetic regulation, all of which also have roots in population genetic and molecular evolutionary processes. Toward the goal of demystifying Darwin's "mystery of mysteries," this review integrates microevolutionary concepts of genetic change with principles of organismal development, establishing explicit links between population genetic process and developmental mechanisms in the production of macroevolutionary pattern. This integration aims to establish a more unified view of speciation that binds process and mechanism.
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Affiliation(s)
- Asher D Cutter
- Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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Uchida Y, Takeda H, Furusawa C, Irie N. Stability in gene expression and body-plan development leads to evolutionary conservation. EvoDevo 2023; 14:4. [PMID: 36918942 PMCID: PMC10015717 DOI: 10.1186/s13227-023-00208-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/06/2022] [Accepted: 03/01/2023] [Indexed: 03/16/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Phenotypic evolution is mainly explained by selection for phenotypic variation arising from factors including mutation and environmental noise. Recent theoretical and experimental studies have suggested that phenotypes with greater developmental stability tend to have a constant phenotype and gene expression level within a particular genetic and environmental condition, and this positively correlates with stronger evolutionary conservation, even after the accumulation of genetic changes. This could reflect a novel mechanism that contributes to evolutionary conservation; however, it remains unclear whether developmental stability is the cause, or whether at least it contributes to their evolutionary conservation. Here, using Japanese medaka lines, we tested experimentally whether developmental stages and gene expression levels with greater stability led to their evolutionary conservation. RESULTS We first measured the stability of each gene expression level and developmental stage (defined here as the whole embryonic transcriptome) in the inbred F0 medaka population. We then measured their evolutionary conservation in the F3 generation by crossing the F0 line with the distantly related Japanese medaka line (Teradomori), followed by two rounds of intra-generational crossings. The results indicated that the genes and developmental stages that had smaller variations in the F0 generation showed lower diversity in the hybrid F3 generation, which implies a causal relationship between stability and evolutionary conservation. CONCLUSIONS These findings suggest that the stability in phenotypes, including the developmental stages and gene expression levels, leads to their evolutionary conservation; this most likely occurs due to their low potential to generate phenotypic variation. In addition, since the highly stable developmental stages match with the body-plan-establishment stage, it also implies that the developmental stability potentially contributed to the strict conservation of animal body plan.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yui Uchida
- Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research, RIKEN, 6-2-3 Furuedai, Suita, Osaka, 565-0874, Japan.
| | - Hiroyuki Takeda
- Department of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-Ku, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan
| | - Chikara Furusawa
- Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research, RIKEN, 6-2-3 Furuedai, Suita, Osaka, 565-0874, Japan.,Universal Biology Institute, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-Ku, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan
| | - Naoki Irie
- Department of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-Ku, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan. .,Universal Biology Institute, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-Ku, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan.
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11
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Reinhardt D, Gola EM. Law and order in plants - the origin and functional relevance of phyllotaxis. TRENDS IN PLANT SCIENCE 2022; 27:1017-1032. [PMID: 35643801 DOI: 10.1016/j.tplants.2022.04.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/25/2021] [Revised: 03/31/2022] [Accepted: 04/26/2022] [Indexed: 06/15/2023]
Abstract
The regular arrangement of organs (phyllotaxis) in vegetative shoots and flowers is one of the most stunning features of plants. Spiral patterns characterized by Fibonacci numbers have attracted the particular interest of natural scientists and mathematicians. Numerous reviews have dealt with the molecular genetic mechanisms underlying phyllotaxis, and modeling studies have sought to recreate phyllotaxis according to mathematical, biochemical, or physical laws. However, what is the functional significance of regular plant architecture, and how did it evolve? We discuss the developmental constraints and selective forces that may have favored the selection of phyllotaxis, and we argue that a central driver of regular phyllotaxis may have been limitations in the allocation of founder cells and metabolic resources to the different tissues in the shoot apex.
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Affiliation(s)
- Didier Reinhardt
- Department of Biology, Route Albert Gockel 3, University of Fribourg, 1700 Fribourg, Switzerland.
| | - Edyta M Gola
- Department of Plant Developmental Biology, Faculty of Plant Sciences, University of Wroclaw, Kanonia 6/8, 50-328, Wroclaw, Poland
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12
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Analysis of the leaf metabolome in Arabidopsis thaliana mutation accumulation lines reveals association of metabolic disruption and fitness consequence. Evol Ecol 2022. [DOI: 10.1007/s10682-022-10210-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/04/2022]
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13
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Uchida Y, Shigenobu S, Takeda H, Furusawa C, Irie N. Potential contribution of intrinsic developmental stability toward body plan conservation. BMC Biol 2022; 20:82. [PMID: 35399082 PMCID: PMC8996622 DOI: 10.1186/s12915-022-01276-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/15/2021] [Accepted: 03/10/2022] [Indexed: 11/10/2022] Open
Abstract
Background Despite the morphological diversity of animals, their basic anatomical patterns—the body plans in each animal phylum—have remained highly conserved over hundreds of millions of evolutionary years. This is attributed to conservation of the body plan-establishing developmental period (the phylotypic period) in each lineage. However, the evolutionary mechanism behind this phylotypic period conservation remains under debate. A variety of hypotheses based on the concept of modern synthesis have been proposed, such as negative selection in the phylotypic period through its vulnerability to embryonic lethality. Here we tested a new hypothesis that the phylotypic period is developmentally stable; it has less potential to produce phenotypic variations than the other stages, and this has most likely led to the evolutionary conservation of body plans. Results By analyzing the embryos of inbred Japanese medaka embryos raised under the same laboratory conditions and measuring the whole embryonic transcriptome as a phenotype, we found that the phylotypic period has greater developmental stability than other stages. Comparison of phenotypic differences between two wild medaka populations indicated that the phylotypic period and its genes in this period remained less variational, even after environmental and mutational modifications accumulated during intraspecies evolution. Genes with stable expression levels were enriched with those involved in cell-cell signalling and morphological specification such as Wnt and Hox, implying possible involvement in body plan development of these genes. Conclusions This study demonstrated the correspondence between the developmental stage with low potential to produce phenotypic variations and that with low diversity in micro- and macroevolution, namely the phylotypic period. Whereas modern synthesis explains evolution as a process of shaping of phenotypic variations caused by mutations, our results highlight the possibility that phenotypic variations are readily limited by the intrinsic nature of organisms, namely developmental stability, thus biasing evolutionary outcomes. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12915-022-01276-5.
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14
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Leong JCK, Li Y, Uesaka M, Uchida Y, Omori A, Hao M, Wan W, Dong Y, Ren Y, Zhang S, Zeng T, Wang F, Chen L, Wessel G, Livingston BT, Bradham C, Wang W, Irie N. Derivedness Index for Estimating Degree of Phenotypic Evolution of Embryos: A Study of Comparative Transcriptomic Analyses of Chordates and Echinoderms. Front Cell Dev Biol 2021; 9:749963. [PMID: 34900995 PMCID: PMC8661034 DOI: 10.3389/fcell.2021.749963] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/30/2021] [Accepted: 11/03/2021] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Species retaining ancestral features, such as species called living fossils, are often regarded as less derived than their sister groups, but such discussions are usually based on qualitative enumeration of conserved traits. This approach creates a major barrier, especially when quantifying the degree of phenotypic evolution or degree of derivedness, since it focuses only on commonly shared traits, and newly acquired or lost traits are often overlooked. To provide a potential solution to this problem, especially for inter-species comparison of gene expression profiles, we propose a new method named "derivedness index" to quantify the degree of derivedness. In contrast to the conservation-based approach, which deals with expressions of commonly shared genes among species being compared, the derivedness index also considers those that were potentially lost or duplicated during evolution. By applying our method, we found that the gene expression profiles of penta-radial phases in echinoderm tended to be more highly derived than those of the bilateral phase. However, our results suggest that echinoderms may not have experienced much larger modifications to their developmental systems than chordates, at least at the transcriptomic level. In vertebrates, we found that the mid-embryonic and organogenesis stages were generally less derived than the earlier or later stages, indicating that the conserved phylotypic period is also less derived. We also found genes that potentially explain less derivedness, such as Hox genes. Finally, we highlight technical concerns that may influence the measured transcriptomic derivedness, such as read depth and library preparation protocols, for further improvement of our method through future studies. We anticipate that this index will serve as a quantitative guide in the search for constrained developmental phases or processes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jason Cheok Kuan Leong
- Department of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Yongxin Li
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Masahiro Uesaka
- RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research (BDR), Kobe, Japan
| | - Yui Uchida
- Department of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.,Universal Biology Institute, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Akihito Omori
- Sado Island Center for Ecological Sustainability, Niigata University, Niigata, Japan
| | - Meng Hao
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Wenting Wan
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Yang Dong
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Yandong Ren
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Si Zhang
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
| | - Tao Zeng
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
| | - Fayou Wang
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
| | - Luonan Chen
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China.,Key Laboratory of Systems Biology, Hangzhou Institute for Advanced Study, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hangzhou, China
| | - Gary Wessel
- Providence Institute of Molecular Oogenesis, Brown University, Providence, RI, United States
| | - Brian T Livingston
- Department of Biological Sciences, California State University, Long Beach, CA, United States
| | - Cynthia Bradham
- Department of Biology, Boston University, Boston, MA, United States
| | - Wen Wang
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China.,School of Ecology and Environment, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi'an, China
| | - Naoki Irie
- Department of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.,Universal Biology Institute, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
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15
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Morris ZS, Vliet KA, Abzhanov A, Pierce SE. Developmental origins of the crocodylian skull table and platyrostral face. Anat Rec (Hoboken) 2021; 305:2838-2853. [PMID: 34694063 DOI: 10.1002/ar.24802] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/09/2021] [Accepted: 09/13/2021] [Indexed: 11/10/2022]
Abstract
The dorsoventrally flattened skull typifies extant Crocodylia perhaps more than any other anatomical feature and is generally considered an adaptation for semi-aquatic feeding. Although the evolutionary origins of caniofacial flattening have been extensively studied, the developmental origins have yet to be explored. To understand how the skull table and platyrostral snout develop, we quantified embryonic development and post-hatching growth (ontogeny) of the crocodylian skull in lateral view using geometric morphometrics. Our dataset (n = 103) includes all but one extant genus and all of the major ecomorphs, including the extremely slender-snouted Gavialis and Tomistoma. Our analysis reveals that the embryonic development of the flattened skull is remarkably similar across ecomorphs, including the presence of a conserved initial embryonic skull shape, similar to prior analysis of dorsal snout shape. Although differences during posthatching ontogeny are recovered among ecomorphs, embryonic patterns are not distinct, revealing an important shift in developmental rate near hatching. In particular, the flattened skull table is achieved by the end of embryonic development with no changes after hatching. Further, the rotation of skull roof and facial bones during development is critical for the stereotypical flatness of the crocodylian skull. Our results suggest selection on hatchling performance and constraints on embryonic skull shape may have been important in this pattern of developmental conservation. The appearance of aspects of cranial flatness among Jurassic stem crocodylians suggests key aspects of these cranial developmental patterns may have been conserved for over 200 million years.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zachary S Morris
- Museum of Comparative Zoology and Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
| | - Kent A Vliet
- Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA
| | - Arhat Abzhanov
- Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London, Berkshire, UK.,Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London, UK
| | - Stephanie E Pierce
- Museum of Comparative Zoology and Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA
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16
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Liu J, Viales RR, Khoueiry P, Reddington JP, Girardot C, Furlong E, Robinson-Rechavi M. The hourglass model of evolutionary conservation during embryogenesis extends to developmental enhancers with signatures of positive selection. Genome Res 2021; 31:1573-1581. [PMID: 34266978 PMCID: PMC8415374 DOI: 10.1101/gr.275212.121] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/04/2021] [Accepted: 06/02/2021] [Indexed: 11/24/2022]
Abstract
Inter-species comparisons of both morphology and gene expression within a phylum have revealed a period in the middle of embryogenesis with more similarity between species compared to earlier and later time-points. This "developmental hourglass" pattern has been observed in many phyla, yet the evolutionary constraints on gene expression, and underlying mechanisms of how this is regulated, remains elusive. Moreover, the role of positive selection on gene regulation in the more diverged earlier and later stages of embryogenesis remains unknown. Here, using DNase-seq to identify regulatory regions in two distant Drosophila species (D. melanogaster and D. virilis), we assessed the evolutionary conservation and adaptive evolution of enhancers throughout multiple stages of embryogenesis. This revealed a higher proportion of conserved enhancers at the phylotypic period, providing a regulatory basis for the hourglass expression pattern. Using an in silico mutagenesis approach, we detect signatures of positive selection on developmental enhancers at early and late stages of embryogenesis, with a depletion at the phylotypic period, suggesting positive selection as one evolutionary mechanism underlying the hourglass pattern of animal evolution.
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17
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Chan ME, Bhamidipati PS, Goldsby HJ, Hintze A, Hofmann HA, Young RL. Comparative Transcriptomics Reveals Distinct Patterns of Gene Expression Conservation through Vertebrate Embryogenesis. Genome Biol Evol 2021; 13:6319027. [PMID: 34247223 PMCID: PMC8358226 DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evab160] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 07/02/2021] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Despite life's diversity, studies of variation often remind us of our shared evolutionary past. Abundant genome sequencing and analyses of gene regulatory networks illustrate that genes and entire pathways are conserved, reused, and elaborated in the evolution of diversity. Predating these discoveries, 19th-century embryologists observed that though morphology at birth varies tremendously, certain stages of vertebrate embryogenesis appear remarkably similar across vertebrates. In the mid to late 20th century, anatomical variability of early and late-stage embryos and conservation of mid-stages embryos (the "phylotypic" stage) was named the hourglass model of diversification. This model has found mixed support in recent analyses comparing gene expression across species possibly owing to differences in species, embryonic stages, and gene sets compared. We compare 186 microarray and RNA-seq data sets covering embryogenesis in six vertebrate species. We use an unbiased clustering approach to group stages of embryogenesis by transcriptomic similarity and ask whether gene expression similarity of clustered embryonic stages deviates from a null expectation. We characterize expression conservation patterns of each gene at each evolutionary node after correcting for phylogenetic nonindependence. We find significant enrichment of genes exhibiting early conservation, hourglass, late conservation patterns in both microarray and RNA-seq data sets. Enrichment of genes showing patterned conservation through embryogenesis indicates diversification of embryogenesis may be temporally constrained. However, the circumstances under which each pattern emerges remain unknown and require both broad evolutionary sampling and systematic examination of embryogenesis across species.
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Affiliation(s)
- Megan E Chan
- Department of Integrative Biology, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA.,Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA
| | - Pranav S Bhamidipati
- Department of Integrative Biology, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA.,Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA
| | - Heather J Goldsby
- Department of Integrative Biology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA
| | - Arend Hintze
- Department of Integrative Biology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan, USA
| | - Hans A Hofmann
- Department of Integrative Biology, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA.,Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA.,Institute for Cellular and Molecular Biology, Institute for Neuroscience, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA
| | - Rebecca L Young
- Department of Integrative Biology, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA.,Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, The University of Texas at Austin, Texas, USA
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18
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Menichelli C, Guitard V, Martins RM, Lèbre S, Lopez-Rubio JJ, Lecellier CH, Bréhélin L. Identification of long regulatory elements in the genome of Plasmodium falciparum and other eukaryotes. PLoS Comput Biol 2021; 17:e1008909. [PMID: 33861755 PMCID: PMC8081344 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008909] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/07/2020] [Revised: 04/28/2021] [Accepted: 03/24/2021] [Indexed: 01/15/2023] Open
Abstract
Long regulatory elements (LREs), such as CpG islands, polydA:dT tracts or AU-rich elements, are thought to play key roles in gene regulation but, as opposed to conventional binding sites of transcription factors, few methods have been proposed to formally and automatically characterize them. We present here a computational approach named DExTER (Domain Exploration To Explain gene Regulation) dedicated to the identification of candidate LREs (cLREs) and apply it to the analysis of the genomes of P. falciparum and other eukaryotes. Our analyses show that all tested genomes contain several cLREs that are somewhat conserved along evolution, and that gene expression can be predicted with surprising accuracy on the basis of these long regions only. Regulation by cLREs exhibits very different behaviours depending on species and conditions. In P. falciparum and other Apicomplexan organisms as well as in Dictyostelium discoideum, the process appears highly dynamic, with different cLREs involved at different phases of the life cycle. For multicellular organisms, the same cLREs are involved in all tissues, but a dynamic behavior is observed along embryonic development stages. In P. falciparum, whose genome is known to be strongly depleted of transcription factors, cLREs are predictive of expression with an accuracy above 70%, and our analyses show that they are associated with both transcriptional and post-transcriptional regulation signals. Moreover, we assessed the biological relevance of one LRE discovered by DExTER in P. falciparum using an in vivo reporter assay. The source code (python) of DExTER is available at https://gite.lirmm.fr/menichelli/DExTER.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Vincent Guitard
- Laboratory of Pathogen-Host Interactions (LPHI), UMR5235, CNRS, Montpellier University, INSERM, Montpellier, France
| | - Rafael M. Martins
- Laboratory of Pathogen-Host Interactions (LPHI), UMR5235, CNRS, Montpellier University, INSERM, Montpellier, France
| | - Sophie Lèbre
- IMAG, Univ. Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, France
- Univ. Paul-Valéry-Montpellier 3, Montpellier, France
| | - Jose-Juan Lopez-Rubio
- Laboratory of Pathogen-Host Interactions (LPHI), UMR5235, CNRS, Montpellier University, INSERM, Montpellier, France
| | - Charles-Henri Lecellier
- LIRMM, Univ Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, France
- Institut de Génétique Moléculaire de Montpellier, University of Montpellier, CNRS, Montpellier, France
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19
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Molecular and evolutionary processes generating variation in gene expression. Nat Rev Genet 2020; 22:203-215. [PMID: 33268840 DOI: 10.1038/s41576-020-00304-w] [Citation(s) in RCA: 111] [Impact Index Per Article: 27.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 10/21/2020] [Indexed: 12/18/2022]
Abstract
Heritable variation in gene expression is common within and between species. This variation arises from mutations that alter the form or function of molecular gene regulatory networks that are then filtered by natural selection. High-throughput methods for introducing mutations and characterizing their cis- and trans-regulatory effects on gene expression (particularly, transcription) are revealing how different molecular mechanisms generate regulatory variation, and studies comparing these mutational effects with variation seen in the wild are teasing apart the role of neutral and non-neutral evolutionary processes. This integration of molecular and evolutionary biology allows us to understand how the variation in gene expression we see today came to be and to predict how it is most likely to evolve in the future.
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20
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Furusawa C, Irie N. Toward understanding of evolutionary constraints: experimental and theoretical approaches. Biophys Rev 2020; 12:1155-1161. [PMID: 32572681 PMCID: PMC7575679 DOI: 10.1007/s12551-020-00708-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/12/2020] [Accepted: 06/11/2020] [Indexed: 12/01/2022] Open
Abstract
Although organisms have diversified remarkably through evolution, they do not exhibit unlimited variability. During evolution, the phenotypic changes do not occur at random; instead, they are directional and restricted by the constraints imposed on them. Despite the perceived importance of characterizing the unevenness of these changes, studies on evolutionary constraints have been primarily qualitative in nature. In this review, we focus on the recent studies of evolutionary constraints, which are based on the quantification of high-dimensional phenotypic and genotypic data. Furthermore, we present a theoretical analysis that enables us to predict evolutionary constraints on the basis of phenotypic fluctuation, modeled on the fluctuation-response relationship in statistical physics. The review lays emphasis on the tight interactions between experimental and theoretical analyses in evolutionary biology that will contribute to a better understanding of evolutionary constraints.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chikara Furusawa
- Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research, RIKEN, 6-2-3 Furuedai, Suita, Osaka, 565-0874, Japan.
- Universal Biology Institute, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan.
| | - Naoki Irie
- Universal Biology Institute, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan.
- Department of Biological Sciences, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan.
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21
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Johnson LM, Smith OJ, Hahn DA, Baer CF. Short-term heritable variation overwhelms 200 generations of mutational variance for metabolic traits in Caenorhabditis elegans. Evolution 2020; 74:2451-2464. [PMID: 32989734 DOI: 10.1111/evo.14104] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/11/2020] [Revised: 08/05/2020] [Accepted: 09/21/2020] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
Abstract
Metabolic disorders have a large heritable component, and have increased markedly in human populations over the past few generations. Genome-wide association studies of metabolic traits typically find a substantial unexplained fraction of total heritability, suggesting an important role of spontaneous mutation. An alternative explanation is that epigenetic effects contribute significantly to the heritable variation. Here, we report a study designed to quantify the cumulative effects of spontaneous mutation on adenosine metabolism in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans, including both the activity and concentration of two metabolic enzymes and the standing pools of their associated metabolites. The only prior studies on the effects of mutation on metabolic enzyme activity, in Drosophila melanogaster, found that total enzyme activity presents a mutational target similar to that of morphological and life-history traits. However, those studies were not designed to account for short-term heritable effects. We find that the short-term heritable variance for most traits is of similar magnitude as the variance among MA lines. This result suggests that the potential heritable effects of epigenetic variation in metabolic disease warrant additional scrutiny.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lindsay M Johnson
- Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, 32611.,Ology Bioservices, Inc., Alachua, Florida, 32615
| | - Olivia J Smith
- Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, 32611
| | - Daniel A Hahn
- Department of Entomology and Nematology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, 32611.,University of Florida Genetics Institute, Gainesville, Florida, 32611
| | - Charles F Baer
- Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, 32611.,University of Florida Genetics Institute, Gainesville, Florida, 32611
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22
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Liu J, Frochaux M, Gardeux V, Deplancke B, Robinson-Rechavi M. Inter-embryo gene expression variability recapitulates the hourglass pattern of evo-devo. BMC Biol 2020; 18:129. [PMID: 32950053 PMCID: PMC7502200 DOI: 10.1186/s12915-020-00842-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/15/2020] [Accepted: 08/07/2020] [Indexed: 02/07/2023] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND The evolution of embryological development has long been characterized by deep conservation. In animal development, the phylotypic stage in mid-embryogenesis is more conserved than either early or late stages among species within the same phylum. Hypotheses to explain this hourglass pattern have focused on purifying the selection of gene regulation. Here, we propose an alternative-genes are regulated in different ways at different stages and have different intrinsic capacities to respond to perturbations on gene expression. RESULTS To eliminate the influence of natural selection, we quantified the expression variability of isogenetic single embryo transcriptomes throughout fly Drosophila melanogaster embryogenesis. We found that the expression variability is lower at the phylotypic stage, supporting that the underlying regulatory architecture in this stage is more robust to stochastic variation on gene expression. We present evidence that the phylotypic stage is also robust to genetic variations on gene expression. Moreover, chromatin regulation appears to play a key role in the variation and evolution of gene expression. CONCLUSIONS We suggest that a phylum-level pattern of embryonic conservation can be explained by the intrinsic difference of gene regulatory mechanisms in different stages.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jialin Liu
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland.
- Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland.
| | - Michael Frochaux
- Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland
- Laboratory of Systems Biology and Genetics, Institute of Bioengineering, School of Life Sciences, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Vincent Gardeux
- Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland
- Laboratory of Systems Biology and Genetics, Institute of Bioengineering, School of Life Sciences, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Bart Deplancke
- Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland
- Laboratory of Systems Biology and Genetics, Institute of Bioengineering, School of Life Sciences, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Marc Robinson-Rechavi
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland.
- Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, 1015, Lausanne, Switzerland.
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23
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Abstract
New species arise as the genomes of populations diverge. The developmental 'alarm clock' of speciation sounds off when sufficient divergence in genetic control of development leads hybrid individuals to infertility or inviability, the world awoken to the dawn of new species with intrinsic post-zygotic reproductive isolation. Some developmental stages will be more prone to hybrid dysfunction due to how molecular evolution interacts with the ontogenetic timing of gene expression. Considering the ontogeny of hybrid incompatibilities provides a profitable connection between 'evo-devo' and speciation genetics to better link macroevolutionary pattern, microevolutionary process, and molecular mechanisms. Here, we explore speciation alongside development, emphasizing their mutual dependence on genetic network features, fitness landscapes, and developmental system drift. We assess models for how ontogenetic timing of reproductive isolation can be predictable. Experiments and theory within this synthetic perspective can help identify new rules of speciation as well as rules in the molecular evolution of development.
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Affiliation(s)
- Asher D Cutter
- Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, University of TorontoTorontoCanada
| | - Joanna D Bundus
- Department of Integrative Biology, University of Wisconsin – MadisonMadisonUnited States
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24
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Levin M, Zalts H, Mostov N, Hashimshony T, Yanai I. Gene expression dynamics are a proxy for selective pressures on alternatively polyadenylated isoforms. Nucleic Acids Res 2020; 48:5926-5938. [PMID: 32421815 PMCID: PMC7293032 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkaa359] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/09/2020] [Revised: 04/11/2020] [Accepted: 04/27/2020] [Indexed: 01/08/2023] Open
Abstract
Alternative polyadenylation (APA) produces isoforms with distinct 3′-ends, yet their functional differences remain largely unknown. Here, we introduce the APA-seq method to detect the expression levels of APA isoforms from 3′-end RNA-Seq data by exploiting both paired-end reads for gene isoform identification and quantification. We detected the expression levels of APA isoforms in individual Caenorhabditis elegans embryos at different stages throughout embryogenesis. Examining the correlation between the temporal profiles of isoforms led us to distinguish two classes of genes: those with highly correlated isoforms (HCI) and those with lowly correlated isoforms (LCI) across time. We hypothesized that variants with similar expression profiles may be the product of biological noise, while the LCI variants may be under tighter selection and consequently their distinct 3′ UTR isoforms are more likely to have functional consequences. Supporting this notion, we found that LCI genes have significantly more miRNA binding sites, more correlated expression profiles with those of their targeting miRNAs and a relative lack of correspondence between their transcription and protein abundances. Collectively, our results suggest that a lack of coherence among the regulation of 3′ UTR isoforms is a proxy for selective pressures acting upon APA usage and consequently for their functional relevance.
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Affiliation(s)
- Michal Levin
- Quantitative Proteomics, Institute of Molecular Biology, Mainz 55128, Germany
| | - Harel Zalts
- Faculty of Biology, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
| | - Natalia Mostov
- Faculty of Biology, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
| | - Tamar Hashimshony
- Faculty of Biology, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 3200003, Israel
| | - Itai Yanai
- Institute for Computational Medicine, NYU Grossman School of Medicine, New York 10016, USA
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25
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Ferretti L, Krämer-Eis A, Schiffer PH. Conserved Patterns in Developmental Processes and Phases, Rather than Genes, Unite the Highly Divergent Bilateria. Life (Basel) 2020; 10:E182. [PMID: 32899936 PMCID: PMC7555945 DOI: 10.3390/life10090182] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/05/2020] [Revised: 08/31/2020] [Accepted: 09/02/2020] [Indexed: 01/03/2023] Open
Abstract
Bilateria are the predominant clade of animals on Earth. Despite having evolved a wide variety of body plans and developmental modes, they are characterized by common morphological traits. By default, researchers have tried to link clade-specific genes to these traits, thus distinguishing bilaterians from non-bilaterians, by their gene content. Here we argue that it is rather biological processes that unite Bilateria and set them apart from their non-bilaterian sisters, with a less complex body morphology. To test this hypothesis, we compared proteomes of bilaterian and non-bilaterian species in an elaborate computational pipeline, aiming to search for a set of bilaterian-specific genes. Despite the limited confidence in their bilaterian specificity, we nevertheless detected Bilateria-specific functional and developmental patterns in the sub-set of genes conserved in distantly related Bilateria. Using a novel multi-species GO-enrichment method, we determined the functional repertoire of genes that are widely conserved among Bilateria. Analyzing expression profiles in three very distantly related model species-D. melanogaster, D. rerio and C. elegans-we find characteristic peaks at comparable stages of development and a delayed onset of expression in embryos. In particular, the expression of the conserved genes appears to peak at the phylotypic stage of different bilaterian phyla. In summary, our study illustrate how development connects distantly related Bilateria after millions of years of divergence, pointing to processes potentially separating them from non-bilaterians. We argue that evolutionary biologists should return from a purely gene-centric view of evolution and place more focus on analyzing and defining conserved developmental processes and periods.
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Affiliation(s)
- Luca Ferretti
- The Pirbright Institute, Ash Road, Pirbright, Surrey GU24 0NF, UK
- Big Data Institute, Nuffield Department of Medicine, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 7BN, UK
| | - Andrea Krämer-Eis
- Institut für Genetik, Universität zu Köln, Zülpicher Straße 47a, 50674 Köln, Germany;
| | - Philipp H. Schiffer
- Institut für Zoologie, Universität zu Köln, Zülpicher Straße 47b, 50674 Köln, Germany
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26
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Li Y, Omori A, Flores RL, Satterfield S, Nguyen C, Ota T, Tsurugaya T, Ikuta T, Ikeo K, Kikuchi M, Leong JCK, Reich A, Hao M, Wan W, Dong Y, Ren Y, Zhang S, Zeng T, Uesaka M, Uchida Y, Li X, Shibata TF, Bino T, Ogawa K, Shigenobu S, Kondo M, Wang F, Chen L, Wessel G, Saiga H, Cameron RA, Livingston B, Bradham C, Wang W, Irie N. Genomic insights of body plan transitions from bilateral to pentameral symmetry in Echinoderms. Commun Biol 2020; 3:371. [PMID: 32651448 PMCID: PMC7351957 DOI: 10.1038/s42003-020-1091-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/18/2019] [Accepted: 06/19/2020] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Echinoderms are an exceptional group of bilaterians that develop pentameral adult symmetry from a bilaterally symmetric larva. However, the genetic basis in evolution and development of this unique transformation remains to be clarified. Here we report newly sequenced genomes, developmental transcriptomes, and proteomes of diverse echinoderms including the green sea urchin (L. variegatus), a sea cucumber (A. japonicus), and with particular emphasis on a sister group of the earliest-diverged echinoderms, the feather star (A. japonica). We learned that the last common ancestor of echinoderms retained a well-organized Hox cluster reminiscent of the hemichordate, and had gene sets involved in endoskeleton development. Further, unlike in other animal groups, the most conserved developmental stages were not at the body plan establishing phase, and genes normally involved in bilaterality appear to function in pentameric axis development. These results enhance our understanding of the divergence of protostomes and deuterostomes almost 500 Mya. Li et al. investigate the evolution and genetic basis of the adult pentameral body plan in echinoderms using genomic, transcriptomic, and proteomic data. They determine that the last common ancestor of echinoderms contained an organized Hox cluster and endoskeleton genes, and suggest that cooption of bilateral development genes was involved in evolution of the pentameric body plan.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yongxin Li
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Akihito Omori
- Sado Island Center for Ecological Sustainability, Niigata University, Niigata, Japan
| | - Rachel L Flores
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, California State Univesity, Long Beach, CA, USA
| | - Sheri Satterfield
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, California State Univesity, Long Beach, CA, USA
| | - Christine Nguyen
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, California State Univesity, Long Beach, CA, USA
| | | | | | - Tetsuro Ikuta
- Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC), Kanagawa, Japan.,Tokyo Metropolitan University, Yokosuka, Tokyo, Japan
| | | | | | - Jason C K Leong
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Adrian Reich
- Providence Institute of Molecular Oogenesis, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA
| | - Meng Hao
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Wenting Wan
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Yang Dong
- Yunnan Agricultural University, Kunming, China
| | - Yaondong Ren
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Si Zhang
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
| | - Tao Zeng
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
| | - Masahiro Uesaka
- RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research (BDR), Kobe, Hyogo, Japan
| | - Yui Uchida
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.,Universal Biology Institute, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Xueyan Li
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China
| | - Tomoko F Shibata
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Takahiro Bino
- NIBB Core Research Facilities, National Institute of Basic Biology, Okazaki, Aichi, Japan
| | - Kota Ogawa
- Faculty of Social and Cultural Studies, Kyushu University, Fukuoka, Japan
| | - Shuji Shigenobu
- NIBB Core Research Facilities, National Institute of Basic Biology, Okazaki, Aichi, Japan
| | - Mariko Kondo
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
| | - Fayou Wang
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China
| | - Luonan Chen
- Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, China.,Key Laboratory of Systems Biology, Hangzhou Institute for Advanced Study, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Hangzhou, China
| | - Gary Wessel
- Providence Institute of Molecular Oogenesis, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA
| | - Hidetoshi Saiga
- Tokyo Metropolitan University, Yokosuka, Tokyo, Japan.,Dept. of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.,Chuo University, Tokyo, Japan
| | - R Andrew Cameron
- Beckman Institute, Division of Biology and Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Brian Livingston
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, California State Univesity, Long Beach, CA, USA
| | | | - Wen Wang
- State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Kunming, China. .,School of Ecology and Environment, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi'an, China.
| | - Naoki Irie
- Dept. of Biological Sciences, Graduate School of Science, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan. .,Universal Biology Institute, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan.
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27
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Ewe CK, Torres Cleuren YN, Rothman JH. Evolution and Developmental System Drift in the Endoderm Gene Regulatory Network of Caenorhabditis and Other Nematodes. Front Cell Dev Biol 2020; 8:170. [PMID: 32258041 PMCID: PMC7093329 DOI: 10.3389/fcell.2020.00170] [Citation(s) in RCA: 13] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/22/2020] [Accepted: 03/02/2020] [Indexed: 01/17/2023] Open
Abstract
Developmental gene regulatory networks (GRNs) underpin metazoan embryogenesis and have undergone substantial modification to generate the tremendous variety of animal forms present on Earth today. The nematode Caenorhabditis elegans has been a central model for advancing many important discoveries in fundamental mechanistic biology and, more recently, has provided a strong base from which to explore the evolutionary diversification of GRN architecture and developmental processes in other species. In this short review, we will focus on evolutionary diversification of the GRN for the most ancient of the embryonic germ layers, the endoderm. Early embryogenesis diverges considerably across the phylum Nematoda. Notably, while some species deploy regulative development, more derived species, such as C. elegans, exhibit largely mosaic modes of embryogenesis. Despite the relatively similar morphology of the nematode gut across species, widespread variation has been observed in the signaling inputs that initiate the endoderm GRN, an exemplar of developmental system drift (DSD). We will explore how genetic variation in the endoderm GRN helps to drive DSD at both inter- and intraspecies levels, thereby resulting in a robust developmental system. Comparative studies using divergent nematodes promise to unveil the genetic mechanisms controlling developmental plasticity and provide a paradigm for the principles governing evolutionary modification of an embryonic GRN.
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Affiliation(s)
- Chee Kiang Ewe
- Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, United States
- Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, United States
| | | | - Joel H. Rothman
- Department of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, United States
- Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, United States
- Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, United States
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28
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Torres Cleuren YN, Ewe CK, Chipman KC, Mears ER, Wood CG, Al-Alami CEA, Alcorn MR, Turner TL, Joshi PM, Snell RG, Rothman JH. Extensive intraspecies cryptic variation in an ancient embryonic gene regulatory network. eLife 2019; 8:48220. [PMID: 31414984 PMCID: PMC6754231 DOI: 10.7554/elife.48220] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/06/2019] [Accepted: 08/15/2019] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Innovations in metazoan development arise from evolutionary modification of gene regulatory networks (GRNs). We report widespread cryptic variation in the requirement for two key regulatory inputs, SKN-1/Nrf2 and MOM-2/Wnt, into the C. elegans endoderm GRN. While some natural isolates show a nearly absolute requirement for these two regulators, in others, most embryos differentiate endoderm in their absence. GWAS and analysis of recombinant inbred lines reveal multiple genetic regions underlying this broad phenotypic variation. We observe a reciprocal trend, in which genomic variants, or knockdown of endoderm regulatory genes, that result in a high SKN-1 requirement often show low MOM-2/Wnt requirement and vice-versa, suggesting that cryptic variation in the endoderm GRN may be tuned by opposing requirements for these two key regulatory inputs. These findings reveal that while the downstream components in the endoderm GRN are common across metazoan phylogeny, initiating regulatory inputs are remarkably plastic even within a single species.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yamila N Torres Cleuren
- Department of MCD Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Chee Kiang Ewe
- Department of MCD Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States
| | - Kyle C Chipman
- Department of MCD Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States
| | - Emily R Mears
- School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Cricket G Wood
- Department of MCD Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States
| | | | - Melissa R Alcorn
- Department of MCD Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States
| | - Thomas L Turner
- Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States
| | - Pradeep M Joshi
- Department of MCD Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States
| | - Russell G Snell
- School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Joel H Rothman
- Department of MCD Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,School of Biological Sciences, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States.,Neuroscience Research Institute, University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, United States
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29
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Cutter AD, Garrett RH, Mark S, Wang W, Sun L. Molecular evolution across developmental time reveals rapid divergence in early embryogenesis. Evol Lett 2019; 3:359-373. [PMID: 31388446 PMCID: PMC6675142 DOI: 10.1002/evl3.122] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/29/2019] [Accepted: 05/30/2019] [Indexed: 12/16/2022] Open
Abstract
Ontogenetic development hinges on the changes in gene expression in time and space within an organism, suggesting that the demands of ontogenetic growth can impose or reveal predictable pattern in the molecular evolution of genes expressed dynamically across development. Here, we characterize coexpression modules of the Caenorhabditis elegans transcriptome, using a time series of 30 points from early embryo to adult. By capturing the functional form of expression profiles with quantitative metrics, we find fastest evolution in the distinctive set of genes with transcript abundance that declines through development from a peak in young embryos. These genes are highly enriched for oogenic function and transient early zygotic expression, are nonrandomly distributed in the genome, and correspond to a life stage especially prone to inviability in interspecies hybrids. These observations conflict with the "early conservation model" for the evolution of development, although expression-weighted sequence divergence analysis provides some support for the "hourglass model." Genes in coexpression modules that peak toward adulthood also evolve fast, being hyper-enriched for roles in spermatogenesis, implicating a history of sexual selection and relaxation of selection on sperm as key factors driving rapid change to ontogenetically distinguishable coexpression modules of genes. We propose that these predictable trends of molecular evolution for dynamically expressed genes across ontogeny predispose particular life stages, early embryogenesis in particular, to hybrid dysfunction in the speciation process.
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Affiliation(s)
- Asher D. Cutter
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary BiologyUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
| | - Rose H. Garrett
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary BiologyUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
- Division of Biostatistics, Dalla Lana School of Public HealthUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
- Department of Statistical SciencesUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
| | - Stephanie Mark
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary BiologyUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
| | - Wei Wang
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary BiologyUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
| | - Lei Sun
- Division of Biostatistics, Dalla Lana School of Public HealthUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
- Department of Statistical SciencesUniversity of TorontoTorontoONM6G1W3Canada
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30
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Liu J, Robinson-Rechavi M. Adaptive Evolution of Animal Proteins over Development: Support for the Darwin Selection Opportunity Hypothesis of Evo-Devo. Mol Biol Evol 2019; 35:2862-2872. [PMID: 30184095 PMCID: PMC6278863 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msy175] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/19/2023] Open
Abstract
A driving hypothesis of evolutionary developmental biology is that animal morphological diversity is shaped both by adaptation and by developmental constraints. Here, we have tested Darwin’s “selection opportunity” hypothesis, according to which high evolutionary divergence in late development is due to strong positive selection. We contrasted it to a “developmental constraint” hypothesis, according to which late development is under relaxed negative selection. Indeed, the highest divergence between species, both at the morphological and molecular levels, is observed late in embryogenesis and postembryonically. To distinguish between adaptation and relaxation hypotheses, we investigated the evidence of positive selection on protein-coding genes in relation to their expression over development, in fly Drosophila melanogaster, zebrafish Danio rerio, and mouse Mus musculus. First, we found that genes specifically expressed in late development have stronger signals of positive selection. Second, over the full transcriptome, genes with evidence for positive selection trend to be expressed in late development. Finally, genes involved in pathways with cumulative evidence of positive selection have higher expression in late development. Overall, there is a consistent signal that positive selection mainly affects genes and pathways expressed in late embryonic development and in adult. Our results imply that the evolution of embryogenesis is mostly conservative, with most adaptive evolution affecting some stages of postembryonic gene expression, and thus postembryonic phenotypes. This is consistent with the diversity of environmental challenges to which juveniles and adults are exposed.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jialin Liu
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.,Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Marc Robinson-Rechavi
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.,Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
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31
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Wu L, Ferger KE, Lambert JD. Gene Expression Does Not Support the Developmental Hourglass Model in Three Animals with Spiralian Development. Mol Biol Evol 2019; 36:1373-1383. [DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msz065] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Abstract
It has been proposed that animals have a pattern of developmental evolution resembling an hourglass because the most conserved development stage—often called the phylotypic stage—is always in midembryonic development. Although the topic has been debated for decades, recent studies using molecular data such as RNA-seq gene expression data sets have largely supported the existence of periods of relative evolutionary conservation in middevelopment, consistent with the phylotypic stage and the hourglass concepts. However, so far this approach has only been applied to a limited number of taxa across the tree of life. Here, using established phylotranscriptomic approaches, we found a surprising reverse hourglass pattern in two molluscs and a polychaete annelid, representatives of the Spiralia, an understudied group that contains a large fraction of metazoan body plan diversity. These results suggest that spiralians have a divergent midembryonic stage, with more conserved early and late development, which is the inverse of the pattern seen in almost all other organisms where these phylotranscriptomic approaches have been reported. We discuss our findings in light of proposed reasons for the phylotypic stage and hourglass model in other systems.
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Affiliation(s)
- Longjun Wu
- Department of Biology, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
| | - Kailey E Ferger
- Department of Biology, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
| | - J David Lambert
- Department of Biology, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
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32
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Katju V, Bergthorsson U. Old Trade, New Tricks: Insights into the Spontaneous Mutation Process from the Partnering of Classical Mutation Accumulation Experiments with High-Throughput Genomic Approaches. Genome Biol Evol 2019; 11:136-165. [PMID: 30476040 PMCID: PMC6330053 DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evy252] [Citation(s) in RCA: 70] [Impact Index Per Article: 14.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 11/22/2018] [Indexed: 12/17/2022] Open
Abstract
Mutations spawn genetic variation which, in turn, fuels evolution. Hence, experimental investigations into the rate and fitness effects of spontaneous mutations are central to the study of evolution. Mutation accumulation (MA) experiments have served as a cornerstone for furthering our understanding of spontaneous mutations for four decades. In the pregenomic era, phenotypic measurements of fitness-related traits in MA lines were used to indirectly estimate key mutational parameters, such as the genomic mutation rate, new mutational variance per generation, and the average fitness effect of mutations. Rapidly emerging next-generating sequencing technology has supplanted this phenotype-dependent approach, enabling direct empirical estimates of the mutation rate and a more nuanced understanding of the relative contributions of different classes of mutations to the standing genetic variation. Whole-genome sequencing of MA lines bears immense potential to provide a unified account of the evolutionary process at multiple levels-the genetic basis of variation, and the evolutionary dynamics of mutations under the forces of selection and drift. In this review, we have attempted to synthesize key insights into the spontaneous mutation process that are rapidly emerging from the partnering of classical MA experiments with high-throughput sequencing, with particular emphasis on the spontaneous rates and molecular properties of different mutational classes in nuclear and mitochondrial genomes of diverse taxa, the contribution of mutations to the evolution of gene expression, and the rate and stability of transgenerational epigenetic modifications. Future advances in sequencing technologies will enable greater species representation to further refine our understanding of mutational parameters and their functional consequences.
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Affiliation(s)
- Vaishali Katju
- Department of Veterinary Integrative Biosciences, College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-4458
| | - Ulfar Bergthorsson
- Department of Veterinary Integrative Biosciences, College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843-4458
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33
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Irie N, Satoh N, Kuratani S. The phylum Vertebrata: a case for zoological recognition. ZOOLOGICAL LETTERS 2018; 4:32. [PMID: 30607258 PMCID: PMC6307173 DOI: 10.1186/s40851-018-0114-y] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/29/2018] [Accepted: 12/05/2018] [Indexed: 06/09/2023]
Abstract
The group Vertebrata is currently placed as a subphylum in the phylum Chordata, together with two other subphyla, Cephalochordata (lancelets) and Urochordata (ascidians). The past three decades, have seen extraordinary advances in zoological taxonomy and the time is now ripe for reassessing whether the subphylum position is truly appropriate for vertebrates, particularly in light of recent advances in molecular phylogeny, comparative genomics, and evolutionary developmental biology. Four lines of current research are discussed here. First, molecular phylogeny has demonstrated that Deuterostomia comprises Ambulacraria (Echinodermata and Hemichordata) and Chordata (Cephalochordata, Urochordata, and Vertebrata), each clade being recognized as a mutually comparable phylum. Second, comparative genomic studies show that vertebrates alone have experienced two rounds of whole-genome duplication, which makes the composition of their gene family unique. Third, comparative gene-expression profiling of vertebrate embryos favors an hourglass pattern of development, the most conserved stage of which is recognized as a phylotypic period characterized by the establishment of a body plan definitively associated with a phylum. This mid-embryonic conservation is supported robustly in vertebrates, but only weakly in chordates. Fourth, certain complex patterns of body plan formation (especially of the head, pharynx, and somites) are recognized throughout the vertebrates, but not in any other animal groups. For these reasons, we suggest that it is more appropriate to recognize vertebrates as an independent phylum, not as a subphylum of the phylum Chordata.
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Affiliation(s)
- Naoki Irie
- Department of Biological Sciences, School of Science, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan
- Universal Biology Institute, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan
| | - Noriyuki Satoh
- Marine Genomics Unit, Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University, Onna, Okinawa, 904-0495 Japan
| | - Shigeru Kuratani
- Laboratory for Evolutionary Morphology, RIKEN Center for Biosystems Dynamics Research, and Evolutionary Morphology Laboratory, RIKEN Cluster for Pioneering Research, 2-2-3 Minatojima-minami, Chuo-ku, Kobe, 650-0047 Japan
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34
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Galis F, Metz JA, van Alphen JJ. Development and Evolutionary Constraints in Animals. ANNUAL REVIEW OF ECOLOGY EVOLUTION AND SYSTEMATICS 2018. [DOI: 10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-110617-062339] [Citation(s) in RCA: 21] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
We review the evolutionary importance of developmental mechanisms in constraining evolutionary changes in animals—in other words, developmental constraints. We focus on hard constraints that can act on macroevolutionary timescales. In particular, we discuss the causes and evolutionary consequences of the ancient metazoan constraint that differentiated cells cannot divide and constraints against changes of phylotypic stages in vertebrates and other higher taxa. We conclude that in all cases these constraints are caused by complex and highly controlled global interactivity of development, the disturbance of which has grave consequences. Mutations that affect such global interactivity almost unavoidably have many deleterious pleiotropic effects, which will be strongly selected against and will lead to long-term evolutionary stasis. The discussed developmental constraints have pervasive consequences for evolution and critically restrict regeneration capacity and body plan evolution.
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Affiliation(s)
- Frietson Galis
- Naturalis Biodiversity Center, 2333 CR Leiden, The Netherlands
| | - Johan A.J. Metz
- Naturalis Biodiversity Center, 2333 CR Leiden, The Netherlands
- International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis, A-2361 Laxenburg, Austria
- Mathematical Institute, University of Leiden; 2333 CA Leiden, The Netherlands
| | - Jacques J.M. van Alphen
- Naturalis Biodiversity Center, 2333 CR Leiden, The Netherlands
- Institute for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Dynamics, University of Amsterdam, 1090 GE Amsterdam, The Netherlands
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35
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Haag ES, Fitch DHA, Delattre M. From "the Worm" to "the Worms" and Back Again: The Evolutionary Developmental Biology of Nematodes. Genetics 2018; 210:397-433. [PMID: 30287515 PMCID: PMC6216592 DOI: 10.1534/genetics.118.300243] [Citation(s) in RCA: 31] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/31/2017] [Accepted: 08/03/2018] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Since the earliest days of research on nematodes, scientists have noted the developmental and morphological variation that exists within and between species. As various cellular and developmental processes were revealed through intense focus on Caenorhabditis elegans, these comparative studies have expanded. Within the genus Caenorhabditis, they include characterization of intraspecific polymorphisms and comparisons of distinct species, all generally amenable to the same laboratory culture methods and supported by robust genomic and experimental tools. The C. elegans paradigm has also motivated studies with more distantly related nematodes and animals. Combined with improved phylogenies, this work has led to important insights about the evolution of nematode development. First, while many aspects of C. elegans development are representative of Caenorhabditis, and of terrestrial nematodes more generally, others vary in ways both obvious and cryptic. Second, the system has revealed several clear examples of developmental flexibility in achieving a particular trait. This includes developmental system drift, in which the developmental control of homologous traits has diverged in different lineages, and cases of convergent evolution. Overall, the wealth of information and experimental techniques developed in C. elegans is being leveraged to make nematodes a powerful system for evolutionary cellular and developmental biology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Eric S Haag
- Department of Biology, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland 20742
| | | | - Marie Delattre
- Laboratoire de Biologie Moléculaire de la Cellule, CNRS, INSERM, Ecole Normale Supérieure de Lyon, 69007, France
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36
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Schaerli Y, Jiménez A, Duarte JM, Mihajlovic L, Renggli J, Isalan M, Sharpe J, Wagner A. Synthetic circuits reveal how mechanisms of gene regulatory networks constrain evolution. Mol Syst Biol 2018; 14:e8102. [PMID: 30201776 PMCID: PMC6129954 DOI: 10.15252/msb.20178102] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/13/2017] [Revised: 08/15/2018] [Accepted: 08/15/2018] [Indexed: 12/22/2022] Open
Abstract
Phenotypic variation is the raw material of adaptive Darwinian evolution. The phenotypic variation found in organismal development is biased towards certain phenotypes, but the molecular mechanisms behind such biases are still poorly understood. Gene regulatory networks have been proposed as one cause of constrained phenotypic variation. However, most pertinent evidence is theoretical rather than experimental. Here, we study evolutionary biases in two synthetic gene regulatory circuits expressed in Escherichia coli that produce a gene expression stripe-a pivotal pattern in embryonic development. The two parental circuits produce the same phenotype, but create it through different regulatory mechanisms. We show that mutations cause distinct novel phenotypes in the two networks and use a combination of experimental measurements, mathematical modelling and DNA sequencing to understand why mutations bring forth only some but not other novel gene expression phenotypes. Our results reveal that the regulatory mechanisms of networks restrict the possible phenotypic variation upon mutation. Consequently, seemingly equivalent networks can indeed be distinct in how they constrain the outcome of further evolution.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yolanda Schaerli
- Department of Fundamental Microbiology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
- Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland
| | - Alba Jiménez
- Systems Biology Program, Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG), Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain
| | - José M Duarte
- Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland
| | - Ljiljana Mihajlovic
- Department of Fundamental Microbiology, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
- Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland
| | | | - Mark Isalan
- Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College London, London, UK
- Imperial College Centre for Synthetic Biology, Imperial College London, London, UK
| | - James Sharpe
- Systems Biology Program, Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG), Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain
- Institucio Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avancats (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain
- EMBL Barcelona European Molecular Biology Laboratory, Barcelona, Spain
| | - Andreas Wagner
- Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies, University of Zurich, Zürich, Switzerland
- The Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
- The Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, NM, USA
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37
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Liu J, Robinson-Rechavi M. Developmental Constraints on Genome Evolution in Four Bilaterian Model Species. Genome Biol Evol 2018; 10:2266-2277. [PMID: 30137380 PMCID: PMC6130771 DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evy177] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 08/17/2018] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Developmental constraints on genome evolution have been suggested to follow either an early conservation model or an "hourglass" model. Both models agree that late development strongly diverges between species, but debate on which developmental period is the most conserved. Here, based on a modified "Transcriptome Age Index" approach, that is, weighting trait measures by expression level, we analyzed the constraints acting on three evolutionary traits of protein coding genes (strength of purifying selection on protein sequences, phyletic age, and duplicability) in four species: Nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans, fly Drosophila melanogaster, zebrafish Danio rerio, and mouse Mus musculus. In general, we found that both models can be supported by different genomic properties. Sequence evolution follows an hourglass model, but the evolution of phyletic age and of duplicability follow an early conservation model. Further analyses indicate that stronger purifying selection on sequences in the middle development are driven by temporal pleiotropy of these genes. In addition, we report evidence that expression in late development is enriched with retrogenes, which usually lack efficient regulatory elements. This implies that expression in late development could facilitate transcription of new genes, and provide opportunities for acquisition of function. Finally, in C. elegans, we suggest that dosage imbalance could be one of the main factors that cause depleted expression of high duplicability genes in early development.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jialin Liu
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Switzerland
- Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Marc Robinson-Rechavi
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Switzerland
- Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
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Schiffer PH, Polsky AL, Cole AG, Camps JIR, Kroiher M, Silver DH, Grishkevich V, Anavy L, Koutsovoulos G, Hashimshony T, Yanai I. The gene regulatory program of Acrobeloides nanus reveals conservation of phylum-specific expression. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 2018; 115:4459-4464. [PMID: 29626130 PMCID: PMC5924915 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1720817115] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The evolution of development has been studied through the lens of gene regulation by examining either closely related species or extremely distant animals of different phyla. In nematodes, detailed cell- and stage-specific expression analyses are focused on the model Caenorhabditis elegans, in part leading to the view that the developmental expression of gene cascades in this species is archetypic for the phylum. Here, we compared two species of an intermediate evolutionary distance: the nematodes C. elegans (clade V) and Acrobeloides nanus (clade IV). To examine A. nanus molecularly, we sequenced its genome and identified the expression profiles of all genes throughout embryogenesis. In comparison with C. elegans, A. nanus exhibits a much slower embryonic development and has a capacity for regulative compensation of missing early cells. We detected conserved stages between these species at the transcriptome level, as well as a prominent middevelopmental transition, at which point the two species converge in terms of their gene expression. Interestingly, we found that genes originating at the dawn of the Ecdysozoa supergroup show the least expression divergence between these two species. This led us to detect a correlation between the time of expression of a gene and its phylogenetic age: evolutionarily ancient and young genes are enriched for expression in early and late embryogenesis, respectively, whereas Ecdysozoa-specific genes are enriched for expression during the middevelopmental transition. Our results characterize the developmental constraints operating on each individual embryo in terms of developmental stages and genetic evolutionary history.
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Affiliation(s)
- Philipp H Schiffer
- Centre for Life's Origins and Evolution, Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, University College London, London WC1E 6BT, United Kingdom
| | - Avital L Polsky
- Department of Biology, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, 32000 Haifa, Israel
| | - Alison G Cole
- Department of Molecular Evolution and Development, University of Vienna, 1090 Vienna, Austria
| | - Julia I R Camps
- Molecular Cell Biology, Institute I for Anatomy University Clinic Cologne, University of Cologne, 50937 Cologne, Germany
| | - Michael Kroiher
- Zoological Institute, Cologne Biocenter, University of Cologne, 50674 Cologne, Germany
| | - David H Silver
- Department of Biology, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, 32000 Haifa, Israel
| | | | - Leon Anavy
- Department of Biology, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, 32000 Haifa, Israel
| | - Georgios Koutsovoulos
- School of Biological Sciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3JW, United Kingdom
| | - Tamar Hashimshony
- Department of Biology, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, 32000 Haifa, Israel
| | - Itai Yanai
- Institute for Computational Medicine, NYU School of Medicine, New York, NY 10016
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Uchida Y, Uesaka M, Yamamoto T, Takeda H, Irie N. Embryonic lethality is not sufficient to explain hourglass-like conservation of vertebrate embryos. EvoDevo 2018; 9:7. [PMID: 29568479 PMCID: PMC5855935 DOI: 10.1186/s13227-018-0095-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/11/2018] [Accepted: 03/09/2018] [Indexed: 12/13/2022] Open
Abstract
Background Understanding the general trends in developmental changes during animal evolution, which are often associated with morphological diversification, has long been a central issue in evolutionary developmental biology. Recent comparative transcriptomic studies revealed that gene expression profiles of mid-embryonic period tend to be more evolutionarily conserved than those in earlier or later periods. While the hourglass-like divergence of developmental processes has been demonstrated in a variety of animal groups such as vertebrates, arthropods, and nematodes, the exact mechanism leading to this mid-embryonic conservation remains to be clarified. One possibility is that the mid-embryonic period (pharyngula period in vertebrates) is highly prone to embryonic lethality, and the resulting negative selections lead to evolutionary conservation of this phase. Here, we tested this “mid-embryonic lethality hypothesis” by measuring the rate of lethal phenotypes of three different species of vertebrate embryos subjected to two kinds of perturbations: transient perturbations and genetic mutations. Results By subjecting zebrafish (Danio rerio), African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis), and chicken (Gallus gallus) embryos to transient perturbations, namely heat shock and inhibitor treatments during three developmental periods [early (represented by blastula and gastrula), pharyngula, and late], we found that the early stages showed the highest rate of lethal phenotypes in all three species. This result was corroborated by perturbation with genetic mutations. By tracking the survival rate of wild-type embryos and embryos with genetic mutations induced by UV irradiation in zebrafish and African clawed frogs, we found that the highest decrease in survival rate was at the early stages particularly around gastrulation in both these species. Conclusion In opposition to the “mid-embryonic lethality hypothesis,” our results consistently showed that the stage with the highest lethality was not around the conserved pharyngula period, but rather around the early period in all the vertebrate species tested. These results suggest that negative selection by embryonic lethality could not explain hourglass-like conservation of animal embryos. This highlights the potential contribution of alternative mechanisms such as the diversifying effect of positive selections against earlier and later stages, and developmental constraints which lead to conservation of mid-embryonic stages. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s13227-018-0095-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yui Uchida
- 1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan
| | - Masahiro Uesaka
- 1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan
| | - Takayoshi Yamamoto
- 1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan
| | - Hiroyuki Takeda
- 1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan.,2Universal Biology Institute, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan
| | - Naoki Irie
- 1Department of Biological Sciences, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan.,2Universal Biology Institute, University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-0033 Japan
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40
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Avital G, Avraham R, Fan A, Hashimshony T, Hung DT, Yanai I. scDual-Seq: mapping the gene regulatory program of Salmonella infection by host and pathogen single-cell RNA-sequencing. Genome Biol 2017; 18:200. [PMID: 29073931 PMCID: PMC5658913 DOI: 10.1186/s13059-017-1340-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 57] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/04/2017] [Accepted: 10/10/2017] [Indexed: 12/20/2022] Open
Abstract
The interaction between a pathogen and a host is a highly dynamic process in which both agents activate complex programs. Here, we introduce a single-cell RNA-sequencing method, scDual-Seq, that simultaneously captures both host and pathogen transcriptomes. We use it to study the process of infection of individual mouse macrophages with the intracellular pathogen Salmonella typhimurium. Among the infected macrophages, we find three subpopulations and we show evidence for a linear progression through these subpopulations, supporting a model in which these three states correspond to consecutive stages of infection.
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Affiliation(s)
- Gal Avital
- Institute for Computational Medicine and Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY, 10016, USA.,Department of Biology, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, 32000, Israel
| | - Roi Avraham
- Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, 02142, USA.,Present address: Department of Biological Regulation, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel
| | - Amy Fan
- Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, 02142, USA
| | - Tamar Hashimshony
- Department of Biology, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, 32000, Israel
| | - Deborah T Hung
- Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, Cambridge, MA, 02142, USA.,Department of Molecular Biology and Center for Computational and Integrative Biology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, MA, 02114, USA.,Department of Genetics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02115, USA
| | - Itai Yanai
- Institute for Computational Medicine and Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, New York University School of Medicine, New York, NY, 10016, USA.
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Yanai I. Development and Evolution through the Lens of Global Gene Regulation. Trends Genet 2017; 34:11-20. [PMID: 29061469 DOI: 10.1016/j.tig.2017.09.011] [Citation(s) in RCA: 10] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/27/2017] [Revised: 09/20/2017] [Accepted: 09/25/2017] [Indexed: 01/09/2023]
Abstract
Evolution and development are two inherently intertwined processes. As the embryo develops it does so in ways that both reflect past constraints and bias the future evolution of the species. While research exploiting this insight typically studies individual genes, transcriptomic analyses have sparked a new wave of discoveries. In this opinion piece, I review the evidence arising from transcriptomics on the topics of the evolution of germ layers, the phylotypic stage, and developmental constraints. The spatiotemporal pattern of gene expression across germ layers provides evidence that the endoderm was the first germ layer to evolve. Comparing transcriptome dynamics throughout developmental time across distant species reveals a mid-developmental transition under strong developmental constraints. These studies highlight the efficiency of exploratory data analysis using computational tools and comparative approaches for discovery.
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Affiliation(s)
- Itai Yanai
- Institute for Computational Medicine, NYU School of Medicine, New York, NY 10016, USA.
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