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Melepat B, Li T, Vinkler M. Natural selection directing molecular evolution in vertebrate viral sensors. DEVELOPMENTAL AND COMPARATIVE IMMUNOLOGY 2024; 154:105147. [PMID: 38325501 DOI: 10.1016/j.dci.2024.105147] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/14/2023] [Revised: 12/30/2023] [Accepted: 02/03/2024] [Indexed: 02/09/2024]
Abstract
Diseases caused by pathogens contribute to molecular adaptations in host immunity. Variety of viral pathogens challenging animal immunity can drive positive selection diversifying receptors recognising the infections. However, whether distinct virus sensing systems differ across animals in their evolutionary modes remains unclear. Our review provides a comparative overview of natural selection shaping molecular evolution in vertebrate viral-binding pattern recognition receptors (PRRs). Despite prevailing negative selection arising from the functional constraints, multiple lines of evidence now suggest diversifying selection in the Toll-like receptors (TLRs), NOD-like receptors (NLRs), RIG-I-like receptors (RLRs) and oligoadenylate synthetases (OASs). In several cases, location of the positively selected sites in the ligand-binding regions suggests effects on viral detection although experimental support is lacking. Unfortunately, in most other PRR families including the AIM2-like receptor family, C-type lectin receptors (CLRs), and cyclic GMP-AMP synthetase studies characterising their molecular evolution are rare, preventing comparative insight. We indicate shared characteristics of the viral sensor evolution and highlight priorities for future research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Balraj Melepat
- Charles University, Faculty of Science, Department of Zoology, Viničná 7, 128 43, Prague, EU, Czech Republic
| | - Tao Li
- Charles University, Faculty of Science, Department of Zoology, Viničná 7, 128 43, Prague, EU, Czech Republic
| | - Michal Vinkler
- Charles University, Faculty of Science, Department of Zoology, Viničná 7, 128 43, Prague, EU, Czech Republic.
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2
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de Flamingh A, Ishida Y, Pečnerová P, Vilchis S, Siegismund HR, van Aarde RJ, Malhi RS, Roca AL. Combining methods for non-invasive fecal DNA enables whole genome and metagenomic analyses in wildlife biology. Front Genet 2023; 13:1021004. [PMID: 36712847 PMCID: PMC9876978 DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2022.1021004] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/16/2022] [Accepted: 12/05/2022] [Indexed: 01/13/2023] Open
Abstract
Non-invasive biological samples benefit studies that investigate rare, elusive, endangered, or dangerous species. Integrating genomic techniques that use non-invasive biological sampling with advances in computational approaches can benefit and inform wildlife conservation and management. Here, we used non-invasive fecal DNA samples to generate low- to medium-coverage genomes (e.g., >90% of the complete nuclear genome at six X-fold coverage) and metagenomic sequences, combining widely available and accessible DNA collection cards with commonly used DNA extraction and library building approaches. DNA preservation cards are easy to transport and can be stored non-refrigerated, avoiding cumbersome or costly sample methods. The genomic library construction and shotgun sequencing approach did not require enrichment or targeted DNA amplification. The utility and potential of the data generated was demonstrated through genome scale and metagenomic analyses of zoo and free-ranging African savanna elephants (Loxodonta africana). Fecal samples collected from free-ranging individuals contained an average of 12.41% (5.54-21.65%) endogenous elephant DNA. Clustering of these elephants with others from the same geographic region was demonstrated by a principal component analysis of genetic variation using nuclear genome-wide SNPs. Metagenomic analyses identified taxa that included Loxodonta, green plants, fungi, arthropods, bacteria, viruses and archaea, showcasing the utility of this approach for addressing complementary questions based on host-associated DNA, e.g., pathogen and parasite identification. The molecular and bioinformatic analyses presented here contributes towards the expansion and application of genomic techniques to conservation science and practice.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alida de Flamingh
- Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States
| | - Yasuko Ishida
- Department of Animal Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States
| | - Patrícia Pečnerová
- Section for Computational and RNA Biology, Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Sahara Vilchis
- Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States
| | - Hans R. Siegismund
- Section for Computational and RNA Biology, Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Rudi J. van Aarde
- Department of Zoology and Entomology, Conservation Ecology Research Unit, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa
| | - Ripan S. Malhi
- Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States
- Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States
| | - Alfred L. Roca
- Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States
- Department of Animal Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL, United States
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3
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Regulation of cGAS Activity and Downstream Signaling. Cells 2022; 11:cells11182812. [PMID: 36139387 PMCID: PMC9496985 DOI: 10.3390/cells11182812] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/19/2022] [Revised: 08/31/2022] [Accepted: 09/05/2022] [Indexed: 11/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Cyclic GMP-AMP synthase (cGAS) is a predominant and ubiquitously expressed cytosolic onfirmedDNA sensor that activates innate immune responses by producing a second messenger, cyclic GMP-AMP (cGAMP), and the stimulator of interferon genes (STING). cGAS contains a highly disordered N-terminus, which can sense genomic/chromatin DNA, while the C terminal of cGAS binds dsDNA liberated from various sources, including mitochondria, pathogens, and dead cells. Furthermore, cGAS cellular localization dictates its response to foreign versus self-DNA. Recent evidence has also highlighted the importance of dsDNA-induced post-translational modifications of cGAS in modulating inflammatory responses. This review summarizes and analyzes cGAS activity regulation based on structure, sub-cellular localization, post-translational mechanisms, and Ca2+ signaling. We also discussed the role of cGAS activation in different diseases and clinical outcomes.
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4
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Bauernfried S, Hornung V. Human NLRP1: From the shadows to center stage. J Exp Med 2022; 219:212910. [PMID: 34910085 PMCID: PMC8679799 DOI: 10.1084/jem.20211405] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 12.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/28/2021] [Revised: 12/03/2021] [Accepted: 12/03/2021] [Indexed: 12/03/2022] Open
Abstract
In response to infection or cell damage, inflammasomes form intracellular multimeric protein complexes that play an essential role in host defense. Activation results in the maturation and subsequent secretion of pro-inflammatory cytokines of the IL-1 family and a specific cell death coined pyroptosis. Human NLRP1 was the first inflammasome-forming sensor identified at the beginning of the millennium. However, its functional relevance and its mechanism of activation have remained obscure for many years. Recent discoveries in the NLRP1 field have propelled our understanding of the functional relevance and molecular mode of action of this unique inflammasome sensor, which we will discuss in this perspective.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stefan Bauernfried
- Gene Center and Department of Biochemistry, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany
| | - Veit Hornung
- Gene Center and Department of Biochemistry, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany
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5
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Tummers B, Green DR. The evolution of regulated cell death pathways in animals and their evasion by pathogens. Physiol Rev 2022; 102:411-454. [PMID: 34898294 PMCID: PMC8676434 DOI: 10.1152/physrev.00002.2021] [Citation(s) in RCA: 42] [Impact Index Per Article: 21.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/14/2021] [Revised: 09/01/2021] [Accepted: 09/01/2022] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
The coevolution of host-pathogen interactions underlies many human physiological traits associated with protection from or susceptibility to infections. Among the mechanisms that animals utilize to control infections are the regulated cell death pathways of pyroptosis, apoptosis, and necroptosis. Over the course of evolution these pathways have become intricate and complex, coevolving with microbes that infect animal hosts. Microbes, in turn, have evolved strategies to interfere with the pathways of regulated cell death to avoid eradication by the host. Here, we present an overview of the mechanisms of regulated cell death in Animalia and the strategies devised by pathogens to interfere with these processes. We review the molecular pathways of regulated cell death, their roles in infection, and how they are perturbed by viruses and bacteria, providing insights into the coevolution of host-pathogen interactions and cell death pathways.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bart Tummers
- Department of Immunology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee
| | - Douglas R Green
- Department of Immunology, St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee
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6
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Ozga AT, Webster TH, Gilby IC, Wilson MA, Nockerts RS, Wilson ML, Pusey AE, Li Y, Hahn BH, Stone AC. Urine as a high-quality source of host genomic DNA from wild populations. Mol Ecol Resour 2021; 21:170-182. [PMID: 32985084 PMCID: PMC7746602 DOI: 10.1111/1755-0998.13260] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/09/2020] [Revised: 08/13/2020] [Accepted: 09/03/2020] [Indexed: 12/28/2022]
Abstract
The ability to generate genomic data from wild animal populations has the potential to give unprecedented insight into the population history and dynamics of species in their natural habitats. However, for many species, it is impossible legally, ethically or logistically to obtain tissue samples of quality sufficient for genomic analyses. In this study we evaluate the success of multiple sources of genetic material (faeces, urine, dentin and dental calculus) and several capture methods (shotgun, whole-genome, exome) in generating genome-scale data in wild eastern chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) from Gombe National Park, Tanzania. We found that urine harbours significantly more host DNA than other sources, leading to broader and deeper coverage across the genome. Urine also exhibited a lower rate of allelic dropout. We found exome sequencing to be far more successful than both shotgun sequencing and whole-genome capture at generating usable data from low-quality samples such as faeces and dental calculus. These results highlight urine as a promising and untapped source of DNA that can be noninvasively collected from wild populations of many species.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrew T. Ozga
- Department of Biological Sciences, Halmos College of Arts and Sciences, Nova Southeastern University
- Center for Evolution and Medicine, Arizona State University
| | - Timothy H. Webster
- Department of Anthropology, University of Utah
- School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University
| | - Ian C. Gilby
- School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University
- Institute of Human Origins, Arizona State University
| | - Melissa A. Wilson
- Center for Evolution and Medicine, Arizona State University
- School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University
| | | | - Michael L. Wilson
- Department of Anthropology, University of Minnesota
- Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, University of Minnesota
| | | | - Yingying Li
- Departments of Medicine and Microbiology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
| | - Beatrice H. Hahn
- Departments of Medicine and Microbiology, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania
| | - Anne C. Stone
- Center for Evolution and Medicine, Arizona State University
- School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University
- Institute of Human Origins, Arizona State University
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7
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Ohsawa S, Umemura T, Terada T, Muto Y. Network and Evolutionary Analysis of Human Epigenetic Regulators to Unravel Disease Associations. Genes (Basel) 2020; 11:genes11121457. [PMID: 33291839 PMCID: PMC7761991 DOI: 10.3390/genes11121457] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/04/2020] [Revised: 11/29/2020] [Accepted: 11/30/2020] [Indexed: 12/15/2022] Open
Abstract
We carried out a system-level analysis of epigenetic regulators (ERs) and detailed the protein–protein interaction (PPI) network characteristics of disease-associated ERs. We found that most diseases associated with ERs can be clustered into two large groups, cancer diseases and developmental diseases. ER genes formed a highly interconnected PPI subnetwork, indicating a high tendency to interact and agglomerate with one another. We used the disease module detection (DIAMOnD) algorithm to expand the PPI subnetworks into a comprehensive cancer disease ER network (CDEN) and developmental disease ER network (DDEN). Using the transcriptome from early mouse developmental stages, we identified the gene co-expression modules significantly enriched for the CDEN and DDEN gene sets, which indicated the stage-dependent roles of ER-related disease genes during early embryonic development. The evolutionary rate and phylogenetic age distribution analysis indicated that the evolution of CDEN and DDEN genes was mostly constrained, and these genes exhibited older evolutionary age. Our analysis of human polymorphism data revealed that genes belonging to DDEN and Seed-DDEN were more likely to show signs of recent positive selection in human history. This finding suggests a potential association between positive selection of ERs and risk of developmental diseases through the mechanism of antagonistic pleiotropy.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shinji Ohsawa
- United Graduate School of Drug Discovery and Medical Information Sciences, Gifu University, 1-1, Yanagido, Gifu 501-1193, Japan; (S.O.); (T.T.)
- Department of Nursing, Ogaki Women’s College, 1-109, Nishinokawa-cho, Ogaki 503-8554, Japan
| | - Toshiaki Umemura
- Graduate School of Medicine and Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Toyama, 2630, Sugitani, Toyama 930-0194, Japan;
| | - Tomoyoshi Terada
- United Graduate School of Drug Discovery and Medical Information Sciences, Gifu University, 1-1, Yanagido, Gifu 501-1193, Japan; (S.O.); (T.T.)
- Department of Functional Bioscience, Gifu University School of Medicine, 1-1, Yanagido, Gifu 501-1193, Japan
| | - Yoshinori Muto
- United Graduate School of Drug Discovery and Medical Information Sciences, Gifu University, 1-1, Yanagido, Gifu 501-1193, Japan; (S.O.); (T.T.)
- Department of Functional Bioscience, Gifu University School of Medicine, 1-1, Yanagido, Gifu 501-1193, Japan
- Correspondence: ; Tel.: +81-58-293-3241
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8
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Bauernfried S, Scherr MJ, Pichlmair A, Duderstadt KE, Hornung V. Human NLRP1 is a sensor for double-stranded RNA. Science 2020; 371:science.abd0811. [PMID: 33243852 DOI: 10.1126/science.abd0811] [Citation(s) in RCA: 186] [Impact Index Per Article: 46.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/04/2020] [Revised: 10/12/2020] [Accepted: 11/18/2020] [Indexed: 12/17/2022]
Abstract
Inflammasomes function as intracellular sensors of pathogen infection or cellular perturbation and thereby play a central role in numerous diseases. Given the high abundance of NLRP1 in epithelial barrier tissues, we screened a diverse panel of viruses for inflammasome activation in keratinocytes. We identified Semliki Forest virus (SFV), a positive-strand RNA virus, as a potent activator of human but not murine NLRP1B. SFV replication and the associated formation of double-stranded (ds) RNA was required to engage the NLRP1 inflammasome. Moreover, delivery of long dsRNA was sufficient to trigger activation. Biochemical studies revealed that NLRP1 binds dsRNA through its leucine-rich repeat domain, resulting in its NACHT domain gaining adenosine triphosphatase activity. Altogether, these results establish human NLRP1 as a direct sensor for dsRNA and thus RNA virus infection.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stefan Bauernfried
- Gene Center and Department of Biochemistry, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany
| | | | - Andreas Pichlmair
- Institute of Virology, Technical University of Munich, School of Medicine, Munich, Germany.,German Center for Infection Research (DZIF), Munich, Germany
| | - Karl E Duderstadt
- Max-Planck Institute of Biochemistry, Martinsried, Germany.,Physics Department, Technical University of Munich, Garching, Germany
| | - Veit Hornung
- Gene Center and Department of Biochemistry, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Munich, Germany. .,Max-Planck Institute of Biochemistry, Martinsried, Germany
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9
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Moreira DA, Lamarca AP, Soares RF, Coelho AMA, Furtado C, Scherer NM, Moreira MAM, Seuánez HN, Boroni M. Transcriptome of the Southern Muriqui Brachyteles arachnoides (Primates:Platyrrhini), a Critically Endangered New World Monkey: Evidence of Adaptive Evolution. Front Genet 2020; 11:831. [PMID: 32849820 PMCID: PMC7412869 DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2020.00831] [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: 04/16/2020] [Accepted: 07/09/2020] [Indexed: 12/03/2022] Open
Abstract
The southern muriqui (Brachyteles arachnoides) is the largest neotropical primate. This species is endemic to Brazil and is currently critically endangered due to its habitat destruction. The genetic basis underlying adaptive traits of New World monkeys has been a subject of interest to several investigators, with significant concern about genes related to the immune system. In the absence of a reference genome, RNA-seq and de novo transcriptome assembly have proved to be valuable genetic procedures for accessing gene sequences and testing evolutionary hypotheses. We present here a first report on the sequencing, assembly, annotation and adaptive selection analysis for thousands of transcripts of B. arachnoides from two different samples, corresponding to 13 different blood cells and fibroblasts. We assembled 284,283 transcripts with N50 of 2,940 bp, with a high rate of complete transcripts, with a median high scoring pair coverage of 88.2%, including low expressed transcripts, accounting for 72.3% of complete BUSCOs. We could predict and extract 81,400 coding sequences with 79.8% of significant BLAST hit against the Euarchontoglires SwissProt dataset. Of these 64,929 sequences, 34,084 were considered homologous to Supraprimate proteins, and of the remaining sequences (30,845), 94% were associated with a protein domain or a KEGG Orthology group, indicating potentially novel or specific protein-coding genes of B. arachnoides. We use the predicted protein sequences to perform a comparative analysis with 10 other primates. This analysis revealed, for the first time in an Atelid species, an expansion of APOBEC3G, extending this knowledge to all NWM families. Using a branch-site model, we searched for evidence of positive selection in 4,533 orthologous sets. This evolutionary analysis revealed 132 amino acid sites in 30 genes potentially evolving under positive selection, shedding light on primate genome evolution. These genes belonged to a wide variety of categories, including those encoding the innate immune system proteins (APOBEC3G, OAS2, and CEACAM1) among others related to the immune response. This work generated a set of thousands of complete sequences that can be used in other studies on molecular evolution and may help to unveil the evolution of primate genes. Still, further functional studies are required to provide an understanding of the underlying evolutionary forces modeling the primate genome.
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Affiliation(s)
- Daniel A Moreira
- Laboratory of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, Division of Experimental and Translational Research, Brazilian National Cancer Institute (INCA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Alessandra P Lamarca
- Laboratory of Bioinformatics and Molecular Evolution, Department of Genetics, Institute of Biology, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Rafael Ferreira Soares
- Laboratory for Functional Genomics and Bioinformatics, Oswaldo Cruz Institute, Fiocruz, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Ana M A Coelho
- Department of Genetics, Institute of Biology, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Carolina Furtado
- Genetics Program, Division of Experimental and Translational Research, Brazilian National Cancer Institute (INCA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Nicole M Scherer
- Laboratory of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, Division of Experimental and Translational Research, Brazilian National Cancer Institute (INCA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Miguel A M Moreira
- Genetics Program, Division of Experimental and Translational Research, Brazilian National Cancer Institute (INCA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Hector N Seuánez
- Genetics Program, Division of Experimental and Translational Research, Brazilian National Cancer Institute (INCA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
| | - Mariana Boroni
- Laboratory of Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, Division of Experimental and Translational Research, Brazilian National Cancer Institute (INCA), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
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10
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Marinić M, Lynch VJ. Relaxed constraint and functional divergence of the progesterone receptor (PGR) in the human stem-lineage. PLoS Genet 2020; 16:e1008666. [PMID: 32302297 PMCID: PMC7190170 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1008666] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/07/2019] [Revised: 04/29/2020] [Accepted: 02/13/2020] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The steroid hormone progesterone, acting through the progesterone receptor (PR), a ligand-activated DNA-binding transcription factor, plays an essential role in regulating nearly every aspect of female reproductive biology. While many reproductive traits regulated by PR are conserved in mammals, Catarrhine primates evolved several derived traits including spontaneous decidualization, menstruation, and a divergent (and unknown) parturition signal, suggesting that PR may also have evolved divergent functions in Catarrhines. There is conflicting evidence, however, whether the progesterone receptor gene (PGR) was positively selected in the human lineage. Here we show that PGR evolved rapidly in the human stem-lineage (as well as other Catarrhine primates), which likely reflects an episode of relaxed selection intensity rather than positive selection. Coincident with the episode of relaxed selection intensity, ancestral sequence resurrection and functional tests indicate that the major human PR isoforms (PR-A and PR-B) evolved divergent functions in the human stem-lineage. These results suggest that the regulation of progesterone signaling by PR-A and PR-B may also have diverged in the human lineage and that non-human animal models of progesterone signaling may not faithfully recapitulate human biology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mirna Marinić
- Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, United States of America
| | - Vincent J. Lynch
- Department of Biological Sciences, University at Buffalo, SUNY, Buffalo, NY, United States of America
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11
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Mitchell PS, Sandstrom A, Vance RE. The NLRP1 inflammasome: new mechanistic insights and unresolved mysteries. Curr Opin Immunol 2019; 60:37-45. [PMID: 31121538 DOI: 10.1016/j.coi.2019.04.015] [Citation(s) in RCA: 119] [Impact Index Per Article: 23.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/05/2019] [Revised: 04/18/2019] [Accepted: 04/19/2019] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
Nucleotide-binding domain, leucine-rich repeat (NLR) proteins constitute a diverse class of innate immune sensors that detect pathogens or stress-associated stimuli in plants and animals. Some NLRs are activated upon direct binding to pathogen-derived ligands. In contrast, we focus here on a vertebrate NLR called NLRP1 that responds to the enzymatic activities of pathogen effectors. We discuss a newly proposed 'functional degradation' mechanism that explains activation and assembly of NLRP1 into an oligomeric complex called an inflammasome. We also discuss how NLRP1 is activated by non-pathogen-associated triggers such as the anti-cancer drug Val-boroPro, or by human disease-associated mutations. Finally, we discuss how research on NLRP1 has led to additional biological insights, including the unexpected discovery of a new CARD8 inflammasome.
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Affiliation(s)
- Patrick S Mitchell
- Division of Immunology & Pathogenesis, Department of Molecular & Cell Biology, and Cancer Research Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA
| | - Andrew Sandstrom
- Division of Immunology & Pathogenesis, Department of Molecular & Cell Biology, and Cancer Research Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA; Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA
| | - Russell E Vance
- Division of Immunology & Pathogenesis, Department of Molecular & Cell Biology, and Cancer Research Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA; Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
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12
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Abstract
Cyclic GMP-AMP synthase (cGAS) is an innate immune system enzyme responsible for recognition of double-stranded DNA aberrantly localized in the cell cytosol. cGAS binds DNA and is activated to catalyze production of the nucleotide second messenger 2'-5'/3'-5' cyclic GMP-AMP (2'3' cGAMP). In spite of a major role for cGAS in the cellular immune response, a complete understanding of cGAS biology has been limited by a lack of genetic tools to rapidly screen cGAS activity, instability of human cGAS-DNA interactions in vitro, and a previous absence of structural information for the human cGAS-DNA complex. Here we detail procedures to map the molecular determinants of cGAS activation and describe methods developed to prepare human cGAS-DNA crystals for structural analysis. Together with earlier systems established to study mammalian homologs of cGAS, these innovations provide a foundation to understand and therapeutically target human cGAS biology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Wen Zhou
- Department of Microbiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, United States
| | - Aaron T Whiteley
- Department of Microbiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, United States
| | - Philip J Kranzusch
- Department of Microbiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, United States; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, United States; Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA, United States.
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13
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Li J, Zeng Z, Wang Y, Liang D, Zhang P. Sequence capture using AFLP-generated baits: A cost-effective method for high-throughput phylogenetic and phylogeographic analysis. Ecol Evol 2019; 9:5925-5937. [PMID: 31161009 PMCID: PMC6540676 DOI: 10.1002/ece3.5176] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/07/2019] [Revised: 03/06/2019] [Accepted: 03/29/2019] [Indexed: 12/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Target sequence capture is an efficient technique to enrich specific genomic regions for high-throughput sequencing in ecological and evolutionary studies. In recent years, many sequence capture approaches have been proposed, but most of them rely on commercial synthetic baits which make the experiment expensive. Here, we present a novel sequence capture approach called AFLP-based genome sequence capture (AFLP Capture). This method uses the AFLP (amplified fragment length polymorphism) technique to generate homemade capture baits without the need for prior genome information, thus is applicable to any organisms. In this approach, biotinylated AFLP fragments representing a random fraction of the genome are used as baits to capture the homologous fragments from genomic shotgun sequencing libraries. In a trial study, by using AFLP Capture, we successfully obtained 511 orthologous loci (>700,000 bp in total length) from 11 Odorrana species and more than 100,000 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in four analyzed individuals of an Odorrana species. This result shows that our method can be used to address questions of various evolutionary depths (from interspecies level to intraspecies level). We also discuss the flexibility in bait preparation and how the sequencing data are analyzed. In summary, AFLP Capture is a rapid and flexible tool and can significantly reduce the experimental cost for phylogenetic studies that require analyzing genome-scale data (hundreds or thousands of loci).
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Affiliation(s)
- Jia‐Xuan Li
- State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, College of Ecology and Evolution, School of Life SciencesSun Yat‐Sen UniversityGuangzhouChina
| | - Zhao‐Chi Zeng
- State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, College of Ecology and Evolution, School of Life SciencesSun Yat‐Sen UniversityGuangzhouChina
| | - Ying‐Yong Wang
- State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, College of Ecology and Evolution, School of Life SciencesSun Yat‐Sen UniversityGuangzhouChina
| | - Dan Liang
- State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, College of Ecology and Evolution, School of Life SciencesSun Yat‐Sen UniversityGuangzhouChina
| | - Peng Zhang
- State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, College of Ecology and Evolution, School of Life SciencesSun Yat‐Sen UniversityGuangzhouChina
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Carey CM, Govande AA, Cooper JM, Hartley MK, Kranzusch PJ, Elde NC. Recurrent Loss-of-Function Mutations Reveal Costs to OAS1 Antiviral Activity in Primates. Cell Host Microbe 2019; 25:336-343.e4. [PMID: 30713099 DOI: 10.1016/j.chom.2019.01.001] [Citation(s) in RCA: 31] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/30/2018] [Revised: 10/07/2018] [Accepted: 12/28/2018] [Indexed: 11/16/2022]
Abstract
Immune responses counteract infections but also cause collateral damage to hosts. Oligoadenylate synthetase 1 (OAS1) binds double-stranded RNA from invading viruses and produces 2'-5' linked oligoadenylate (2-5A) to activate ribonuclease L (RNase L), which cleaves RNA to inhibit virus replication. OAS1 can also undergo autoactivation by host RNAs, a potential trade-off to antiviral activity. We investigated functional variation in primate OAS1 as a model for how immune pathways evolve to mitigate costs and observed a surprising frequency of loss-of-function variation. In gorillas, we identified a polymorphism that severely decreases catalytic function, mirroring a common variant in humans that impairs 2-5A synthesis through alternative splicing. OAS1 loss-of-function variation is also common in monkeys, including complete loss of 2-5A synthesis in tamarins. The frequency of loss-of-function alleles suggests that costs associated with OAS1 activation can be so detrimental to host fitness that pathogen-protective effects are repeatedly forfeited.
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Affiliation(s)
- Clayton M Carey
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA
| | - Apurva A Govande
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Juliane M Cooper
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA
| | - Melissa K Hartley
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA
| | - Philip J Kranzusch
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Nels C Elde
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA.
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15
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Hoff SNK, Baalsrud HT, Tooming-Klunderud A, Skage M, Richmond T, Obernosterer G, Shirzadi R, Tørresen OK, Jakobsen KS, Jentoft S. Long-read sequence capture of the haemoglobin gene clusters across codfish species. Mol Ecol Resour 2018; 19:245-259. [PMID: 30329222 PMCID: PMC7379720 DOI: 10.1111/1755-0998.12955] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/03/2018] [Revised: 10/05/2018] [Accepted: 10/09/2018] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
Abstract
Combining high-throughput sequencing with targeted sequence capture has become an attractive tool to study specific genomic regions of interest. Most studies have so far focused on the exome using short-read technology. These approaches are not designed to capture intergenic regions needed to reconstruct genomic organization, including regulatory regions and gene synteny. Here, we demonstrate the power of combining targeted sequence capture with long-read sequencing technology for comparative genomic analyses of the haemoglobin (Hb) gene clusters across eight species separated by up to 70 million years. Guided by the reference genome assembly of the Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua) together with genome information from draft assemblies of selected codfishes, we designed probes covering the two Hb gene clusters. Use of custom-made barcodes combined with PacBio RSII sequencing led to highly continuous assemblies of the LA (~100 kb) and MN (~200 kb) clusters, which include syntenic regions of coding and intergenic sequences. Our results revealed an overall conserved genomic organization of the Hb genes within this lineage, yet with several, lineage-specific gene duplications. Moreover, for some of the species examined, we identified amino acid substitutions at two sites in the Hbb1 gene as well as length polymorphisms in its regulatory region, which has previously been linked to temperature adaptation in Atlantic cod populations. This study highlights the use of targeted long-read capture as a versatile approach for comparative genomic studies by generation of a cross-species genomic resource elucidating the evolutionary history of the Hb gene family across the highly divergent group of codfishes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Siv Nam Khang Hoff
- Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
| | - Helle T Baalsrud
- Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
| | - Ave Tooming-Klunderud
- Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
| | - Morten Skage
- Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
| | | | | | | | - Ole Kristian Tørresen
- Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
| | - Kjetill S Jakobsen
- Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
| | - Sissel Jentoft
- Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, Department of Biosciences, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
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16
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Zhou W, Whiteley AT, de Oliveira Mann CC, Morehouse BR, Nowak RP, Fischer ES, Gray NS, Mekalanos JJ, Kranzusch PJ. Structure of the Human cGAS-DNA Complex Reveals Enhanced Control of Immune Surveillance. Cell 2018; 174:300-311.e11. [PMID: 30007416 PMCID: PMC6084792 DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2018.06.026] [Citation(s) in RCA: 225] [Impact Index Per Article: 37.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/22/2018] [Revised: 05/01/2018] [Accepted: 06/12/2018] [Indexed: 12/20/2022]
Abstract
Cyclic GMP-AMP synthase (cGAS) recognition of cytosolic DNA is critical for immune responses to pathogen replication, cellular stress, and cancer. Existing structures of the mouse cGAS-DNA complex provide a model for enzyme activation but do not explain why human cGAS exhibits severely reduced levels of cyclic GMP-AMP (cGAMP) synthesis compared to other mammals. Here, we discover that enhanced DNA-length specificity restrains human cGAS activation. Using reconstitution of cGAMP signaling in bacteria, we mapped the determinant of human cGAS regulation to two amino acid substitutions in the DNA-binding surface. Human-specific substitutions are necessary and sufficient to direct preferential detection of long DNA. Crystal structures reveal why removal of human substitutions relaxes DNA-length specificity and explain how human-specific DNA interactions favor cGAS oligomerization. These results define how DNA-sensing in humans adapted for enhanced specificity and provide a model of the active human cGAS-DNA complex to enable structure-guided design of cGAS therapeutics.
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Affiliation(s)
- Wen Zhou
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Aaron T Whiteley
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Carina C de Oliveira Mann
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Benjamin R Morehouse
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Radosław P Nowak
- Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Biology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Eric S Fischer
- Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Biology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Nathanael S Gray
- Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Biology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - John J Mekalanos
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Philip J Kranzusch
- Department of Microbiology and Immunobiology, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, USA; Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA.
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17
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Reales G, Paixão-Côrtes VR, Cybis GB, Gonçalves GL, Pissinatti A, Salzano FM, Bortolini MC. Serotonin, behavior, and natural selection in New World monkeys. J Evol Biol 2018; 31:1180-1192. [DOI: 10.1111/jeb.13295] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/27/2017] [Accepted: 05/16/2018] [Indexed: 12/31/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Guillermo Reales
- Departamento de Genética; Instituto de Biociências; Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul; Porto Alegre RS Brazil
| | | | - Gabriela B. Cybis
- Departamento de Estatística; Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul; Porto Alegre RS Brazil
| | - Gislene L. Gonçalves
- Departamento de Genética; Instituto de Biociências; Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul; Porto Alegre RS Brazil
| | | | - Francisco M. Salzano
- Departamento de Genética; Instituto de Biociências; Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul; Porto Alegre RS Brazil
| | - Maria Cátira Bortolini
- Departamento de Genética; Instituto de Biociências; Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul; Porto Alegre RS Brazil
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18
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Quantitative evolutionary proteomics of seminal fluid from primates with different mating systems. BMC Genomics 2018; 19:488. [PMID: 29929489 PMCID: PMC6014011 DOI: 10.1186/s12864-018-4872-x] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/08/2018] [Accepted: 06/15/2018] [Indexed: 11/10/2022] Open
Abstract
BACKGROUND Genomic data from various organisms have been used to study how sexual selection has shaped genetic diversity in reproductive proteins, and in particular, to elucidate how mating systems may have influenced evolution at the molecular and phenotypic levels. However, large-scale proteomic data including protein identifications and abundances are only now entering the field of evolutionary and comparative genomics. Variation in both protein sequence and expression level may play important roles in the evolution of sexual traits and behaviors. RESULTS Here, we broadly analyze the components of seminal fluid from primates with diverse mating systems ranging from monogamous to polygynous, and include genomics, proteomics, phylogenetic and quantitative characters into our framework. Our analyses show that seminal fluid proteins are undergoing rapid evolution and some of these quickly evolving proteins may be influenced by sexual selection. Through evolutionary analyses and protein abundance differences, we identified 84 genes whose evolutionary rates or expression levels were correlated with mating system and other sexual characters. We found that many proteins differ in abundance between monogamous and polygynous primate mating systems. Many of these proteins are enriched in the copulatory plug pathway, which suggests that post-zygotic selective barriers are important regardless of mating system type. CONCLUSIONS This work is the first to comprehensively compare seminal fluid proteins between human and non-human primates using high-throughput proteomics. Our findings highlight the impact of mating system variation on seminal fluid protein evolution and abundance.
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19
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Kronenberg ZN, Fiddes IT, Gordon D, Murali S, Cantsilieris S, Meyerson OS, Underwood JG, Nelson BJ, Chaisson MJP, Dougherty ML, Munson KM, Hastie AR, Diekhans M, Hormozdiari F, Lorusso N, Hoekzema K, Qiu R, Clark K, Raja A, Welch AE, Sorensen M, Baker C, Fulton RS, Armstrong J, Graves-Lindsay TA, Denli AM, Hoppe ER, Hsieh P, Hill CM, Pang AWC, Lee J, Lam ET, Dutcher SK, Gage FH, Warren WC, Shendure J, Haussler D, Schneider VA, Cao H, Ventura M, Wilson RK, Paten B, Pollen A, Eichler EE. High-resolution comparative analysis of great ape genomes. Science 2018; 360:eaar6343. [PMID: 29880660 PMCID: PMC6178954 DOI: 10.1126/science.aar6343] [Citation(s) in RCA: 237] [Impact Index Per Article: 39.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/07/2017] [Accepted: 04/02/2018] [Indexed: 12/22/2022]
Abstract
Genetic studies of human evolution require high-quality contiguous ape genome assemblies that are not guided by the human reference. We coupled long-read sequence assembly and full-length complementary DNA sequencing with a multiplatform scaffolding approach to produce ab initio chimpanzee and orangutan genome assemblies. By comparing these with two long-read de novo human genome assemblies and a gorilla genome assembly, we characterized lineage-specific and shared great ape genetic variation ranging from single- to mega-base pair-sized variants. We identified ~17,000 fixed human-specific structural variants identifying genic and putative regulatory changes that have emerged in humans since divergence from nonhuman apes. Interestingly, these variants are enriched near genes that are down-regulated in human compared to chimpanzee cerebral organoids, particularly in cells analogous to radial glial neural progenitors.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zev N Kronenberg
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Ian T Fiddes
- UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA
| | - David Gordon
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Shwetha Murali
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Stuart Cantsilieris
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Olivia S Meyerson
- Department of Neurology, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94158, USA
| | - Jason G Underwood
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- Pacific Biosciences (PacBio) of California, Inc., Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA
| | - Bradley J Nelson
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Mark J P Chaisson
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA 90089, USA
| | - Max L Dougherty
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Katherine M Munson
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | | | - Mark Diekhans
- UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA
| | - Fereydoun Hormozdiari
- Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA 95817, USA
| | - Nicola Lorusso
- Department of Biology, University of Bari, Aldo Moro, Bari 70121, Italy
| | - Kendra Hoekzema
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Ruolan Qiu
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Karen Clark
- National Center for Biotechnology Information, National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20894, USA
| | - Archana Raja
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - AnneMarie E Welch
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Melanie Sorensen
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Carl Baker
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Robert S Fulton
- Departments of Medicine and Genetics, McDonnell Genome Institute, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63108, USA
| | - Joel Armstrong
- UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA
| | - Tina A Graves-Lindsay
- Departments of Medicine and Genetics, McDonnell Genome Institute, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63108, USA
| | - Ahmet M Denli
- The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Emma R Hoppe
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - PingHsun Hsieh
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - Christopher M Hill
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | | | - Joyce Lee
- Bionano Genomics, San Diego, CA 92121, USA
| | | | - Susan K Dutcher
- Departments of Medicine and Genetics, McDonnell Genome Institute, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63108, USA
| | - Fred H Gage
- The Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, CA 92037, USA
| | - Wesley C Warren
- Departments of Medicine and Genetics, McDonnell Genome Institute, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63108, USA
| | - Jay Shendure
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
| | - David Haussler
- UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA
| | - Valerie A Schneider
- National Center for Biotechnology Information, National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20894, USA
| | - Han Cao
- Bionano Genomics, San Diego, CA 92121, USA
| | - Mario Ventura
- Department of Biology, University of Bari, Aldo Moro, Bari 70121, Italy
| | - Richard K Wilson
- Departments of Medicine and Genetics, McDonnell Genome Institute, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, MO 63108, USA
| | - Benedict Paten
- UC Santa Cruz Genomics Institute, University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA
| | - Alex Pollen
- Department of Neurology, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94158, USA
- Eli and Edythe Broad Center of Regeneration Medicine and Stem Cell Research, University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, CA 94143, USA
| | - Evan E Eichler
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA 98195, USA.
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA
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20
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Rotwein P. Similarity and variation in the insulin-like growth factor 2 - H19 locus in primates. Physiol Genomics 2018; 50:425-439. [PMID: 29602297 PMCID: PMC6032289 DOI: 10.1152/physiolgenomics.00030.2018] [Citation(s) in RCA: 7] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/15/2018] [Revised: 03/22/2018] [Accepted: 03/23/2018] [Indexed: 02/07/2023] Open
Abstract
Insulin-like growth factor 2 (IGF2), a small, secreted protein, is critical for fetal and prenatal growth in humans and other mammals. The IGF2 gene and its mouse homolog comprise part of a conserved linkage group that is regulated by parental imprinting, with IGF2/ Igf2 being expressed from the paternal chromosome, and the adjacent H19 gene from the maternal chromosome. By using information extracted from public genomic and gene expression databases, I have now analyzed this locus in nine nonhuman primate species representing over 60 million years of evolutionary divergence from a common progenitor. Both IGF2 and H19 genes and the entire locus have been conserved among these primates. Each primate IGF2 gene except for gibbon and marmoset is composed of 10 exons and contains five potential promoters, each with distinctive 5'-untranslated exons. Similarly, except for marmoset and mouse lemur, H19 consists of six exons and has two promoters. DNA sequence conservation is high, not only in orthologous exons and promoters, but also in a putative imprinting control region located 5' to H19 and in multiple potential distal enhancer elements found 3' to H19. Collectively, these results support the hypothesis that common regulatory processes shaped the IGF2 - H19 locus before the onset of primate speciation more than 85 million years ago. This study also leads to the conclusion that inaccuracies in data presentation in genetic repositories could limit our ability to develop novel insights about roles of individual genes and multigene loci in mammalian physiology and disease.
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Affiliation(s)
- Peter Rotwein
- Department of Biomedical Sciences, Paul L. Foster School of Medicine, Texas Tech Health University Health Sciences Center , El Paso, Texas
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21
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Methylation-based enrichment facilitates low-cost, noninvasive genomic scale sequencing of populations from feces. Sci Rep 2018; 8:1975. [PMID: 29386638 PMCID: PMC5792461 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-20427-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 48] [Impact Index Per Article: 8.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/04/2017] [Accepted: 01/18/2018] [Indexed: 12/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Obtaining high-quality samples from wild animals is a major obstacle for genomic studies of many taxa, particularly at the population level, as collection methods for such samples are typically invasive. DNA from feces is easy to obtain noninvasively, but is dominated by bacterial and other non-host DNA. The high proportion of non-host DNA drastically reduces the efficiency of high-throughput sequencing for host animal genomics. To address this issue, we developed an inexpensive capture method for enriching host DNA from noninvasive fecal samples. Our method exploits natural differences in CpG-methylation density between vertebrate and bacterial genomes to preferentially bind and isolate host DNA from majority-bacterial samples. We demonstrate that the enrichment is robust, efficient, and compatible with downstream library preparation methods useful for population studies (e.g., RADseq). Compared to other enrichment strategies, our method is quick and inexpensive, adding only a negligible cost to sample preparation. In combination with downstream methods such as RADseq, our approach allows for cost-effective and customizable genomic-scale genotyping that was previously feasible in practice only with invasive samples. Because feces are widely available and convenient to collect, our method empowers researchers to explore genomic-scale population-level questions in organisms for which invasive sampling is challenging or undesirable.
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22
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Lesur I, Alexandre H, Boury C, Chancerel E, Plomion C, Kremer A. Development of Target Sequence Capture and Estimation of Genomic Relatedness in a Mixed Oak Stand. FRONTIERS IN PLANT SCIENCE 2018; 9:996. [PMID: 30057586 PMCID: PMC6053538 DOI: 10.3389/fpls.2018.00996] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/13/2018] [Accepted: 06/19/2018] [Indexed: 05/19/2023]
Abstract
Anticipating the evolutionary responses of long-lived organisms, such as trees, to environmental changes, requires the assessment of genetic variation of adaptive traits in natural populations. To this end, high-density markers are needed to calculate genomic relatedness between individuals allowing to estimate the genetic variance of traits in wild populations. We designed a targeted capture-based, next-generation sequencing assay based on the highly heterozygous pedunculate oak (Quercus robur) reference genome, for the sequencing of 3 Mb of genic and intergenic regions. Using a mixed stand of 293 Q. robur and Q. petraea genotypes we successfully captured over 97% of the target sequences, corresponding to 0.39% of the oak genome, with sufficient depth (97×) for the detection of about 190,000 SNPs evenly spread over the targeted regions. We validated the technique by evaluating its reproducibility, and comparing the genomic relatedness of trees with their known pedigree relationship. We explored the use of the technique on other related species and highlighted the advantages and limitations of this approach. We found that 92.07% of target sequences in Q. suber and 70.36% of sequences in Fagus sylvatica were captured. We used this SNP resource to estimate genetic relatedness in the mixed oak stand. Mean pairwise genetic relatedness was low within each species with a few values exceeding 0.25 (half-sibs) or 0.5 (full-sibs). Finally, we applied the technique to a long-standing issue in population genetics of trees regarding the relationship between inbreeding and components of fitness. We found very weak signals for inbreeding depression for reproductive success and no signal for growth within both species.
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Affiliation(s)
- Isabelle Lesur
- INRA, UMR 1202, Biodiversité Gènes et Communautés, Université Bordeaux, Pessac, France
- HelixVenture, Mérignac, France
- *Correspondence: Isabelle Lesur,
| | - Hermine Alexandre
- INRA, UMR 1202, Biodiversité Gènes et Communautés, Université Bordeaux, Pessac, France
| | - Christophe Boury
- INRA, UMR 1202, Biodiversité Gènes et Communautés, Université Bordeaux, Pessac, France
| | - Emilie Chancerel
- INRA, UMR 1202, Biodiversité Gènes et Communautés, Université Bordeaux, Pessac, France
| | - Christophe Plomion
- INRA, UMR 1202, Biodiversité Gènes et Communautés, Université Bordeaux, Pessac, France
| | - Antoine Kremer
- INRA, UMR 1202, Biodiversité Gènes et Communautés, Université Bordeaux, Pessac, France
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23
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van der Lee R, Wiel L, van Dam TJP, Huynen MA. Genome-scale detection of positive selection in nine primates predicts human-virus evolutionary conflicts. Nucleic Acids Res 2017; 45:10634-10648. [PMID: 28977405 PMCID: PMC5737536 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkx704] [Citation(s) in RCA: 47] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/02/2017] [Accepted: 08/02/2017] [Indexed: 12/17/2022] Open
Abstract
Hotspots of rapid genome evolution hold clues about human adaptation. We present a comparative analysis of nine whole-genome sequenced primates to identify high-confidence targets of positive selection. We find strong statistical evidence for positive selection in 331 protein-coding genes (3%), pinpointing 934 adaptively evolving codons (0.014%). Our new procedure is stringent and reveals substantial artefacts (20% of initial predictions) that have inflated previous estimates. The final 331 positively selected genes (PSG) are strongly enriched for innate and adaptive immunity, secreted and cell membrane proteins (e.g. pattern recognition, complement, cytokines, immune receptors, MHC, Siglecs). We also find evidence for positive selection in reproduction and chromosome segregation (e.g. centromere-associated CENPO, CENPT), apolipoproteins, smell/taste receptors and mitochondrial proteins. Focusing on the virus–host interaction, we retrieve most evolutionary conflicts known to influence antiviral activity (e.g. TRIM5, MAVS, SAMHD1, tetherin) and predict 70 novel cases through integration with virus–human interaction data. Protein structure analysis further identifies positive selection in the interaction interfaces between viruses and their cellular receptors (CD4-HIV; CD46-measles, adenoviruses; CD55-picornaviruses). Finally, primate PSG consistently show high sequence variation in human exomes, suggesting ongoing evolution. Our curated dataset of positive selection is a rich source for studying the genetics underlying human (antiviral) phenotypes. Procedures and data are available at https://github.com/robinvanderlee/positive-selection.
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Affiliation(s)
- Robin van der Lee
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
| | - Laurens Wiel
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands.,Department of Human Genetics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
| | - Teunis J P van Dam
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
| | - Martijn A Huynen
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
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24
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Boddy AM, Harrison PW, Montgomery SH, Caravas JA, Raghanti MA, Phillips KA, Mundy NI, Wildman DE. Evidence of a Conserved Molecular Response to Selection for Increased Brain Size in Primates. Genome Biol Evol 2017; 9:700-713. [PMID: 28391320 PMCID: PMC5381557 DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evx028] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 02/23/2017] [Indexed: 12/12/2022] Open
Abstract
The adaptive significance of human brain evolution has been frequently studied through comparisons with other primates. However, the evolution of increased brain size is not restricted to the human lineage but is a general characteristic of primate evolution. Whether or not these independent episodes of increased brain size share a common genetic basis is unclear. We sequenced and de novo assembled the transcriptome from the neocortical tissue of the most highly encephalized nonhuman primate, the tufted capuchin monkey (Cebus apella). Using this novel data set, we conducted a genome-wide analysis of orthologous brain-expressed protein coding genes to identify evidence of conserved gene–phenotype associations and species-specific adaptations during three independent episodes of brain size increase. We identify a greater number of genes associated with either total brain mass or relative brain size across these six species than show species-specific accelerated rates of evolution in individual large-brained lineages. We test the robustness of these associations in an expanded data set of 13 species, through permutation tests and by analyzing how genome-wide patterns of substitution co-vary with brain size. Many of the genes targeted by selection during brain expansion have glutamatergic functions or roles in cell cycle dynamics. We also identify accelerated evolution in a number of individual capuchin genes whose human orthologs are associated with human neuropsychiatric disorders. These findings demonstrate the value of phenotypically informed genome analyses, and suggest at least some aspects of human brain evolution have occurred through conserved gene–phenotype associations. Understanding these commonalities is essential for distinguishing human-specific selection events from general trends in brain evolution.
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Affiliation(s)
- Amy M Boddy
- The Biodesign Institute, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ.,Wayne State University School of Medicine, Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics, Detroit, Michigan, Detroit, MI
| | - Peter W Harrison
- Department of Genetics Evolution & Environment, University College London, United Kingdom.,European Molecular Biology Laboratory, European Bioinformatics Institute, Wellcome Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridge, United Kingdom
| | - Stephen H Montgomery
- Department of Genetics Evolution & Environment, University College London, United Kingdom.,Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom
| | - Jason A Caravas
- Wayne State University School of Medicine, Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics, Detroit, Michigan, Detroit, MI
| | - Mary Ann Raghanti
- Department of Anthropology and School of Biomedical Sciences, Kent State University, Kent, OH
| | | | | | - Derek E Wildman
- Wayne State University School of Medicine, Center for Molecular Medicine and Genetics, Detroit, Michigan, Detroit, MI.,Department of Molecular & Integrative Physiology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL.,Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL
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25
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McCreight JC, Schneider SE, Wilburn DB, Swanson WJ. Evolution of microRNA in primates. PLoS One 2017; 12:e0176596. [PMID: 28640911 PMCID: PMC5480830 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0176596] [Citation(s) in RCA: 33] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/10/2016] [Accepted: 04/13/2017] [Indexed: 12/23/2022] Open
Abstract
MicroRNA play an important role in post-transcriptional regulation of most transcripts in the human genome, but their evolution across the primate lineage is largely uncharacterized. A particular miRNA can have one to thousands of messenger RNA targets, establishing the potential for a small change in sequence or overall miRNA structure to have profound phenotypic effects. However, the majority of non-human primate miRNA is predicted solely by homology to the human genome and lacks experimental validation. In the present study, we sequenced thirteen species representing a wide range of the primate phylogeny. Hundreds of miRNA were validated, and the number of species with experimentally validated miRNA was tripled. These species include a sister taxon to humans (bonobo) and basal primates (aye-aye, mouse lemur, galago). Consistent with previous studies, we found the seed region and mature miRNA to be highly conserved across primates, with overall structural conservation of the pre-miRNA hairpin. However, there were a number of interesting exceptions, including a seed shift due to structural changes in miR-501. We also identified an increase in the number of miR-320 paralogs throughout primate evolution. Many of these non-conserved miRNA appear to regulate neuronal processes, illustrating the importance of investigating miRNA to learn more about human evolution.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jey C. McCreight
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Sean E. Schneider
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
- Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Damien B. Wilburn
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Willie J. Swanson
- Department of Genome Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
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26
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Barber MF, Lee EM, Griffin H, Elde NC. Rapid Evolution of Primate Type 2 Immune Response Factors Linked to Asthma Susceptibility. Genome Biol Evol 2017; 9:1757-1765. [PMID: 28854632 PMCID: PMC5569703 DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evx120] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Accepted: 07/03/2017] [Indexed: 02/06/2023] Open
Abstract
Host immunity pathways evolve rapidly in response to antagonism by pathogens. Microbial infections can also trigger excessive inflammation that contributes to diverse autoimmune disorders including asthma, lupus, diabetes, and arthritis. Definitive links between immune system evolution and human autoimmune disease remain unclear. Here we provide evidence that several components of the type 2 immune response pathway have been subject to recurrent positive selection in the primate lineage. Notably, substitutions in the central immune regulator IL13 correspond to a polymorphism linked to asthma susceptibility in humans. We also find evidence of accelerated amino acid substitutions as well as gene gain and loss events among eosinophil granule proteins, which act as toxic antimicrobial effectors that promote asthma pathology by damaging airway tissues. These results support the hypothesis that evolutionary conflicts with pathogens promote tradeoffs for increasingly robust immune responses during animal evolution. Our findings are also consistent with the view that natural selection has contributed to the spread of autoimmune disease alleles in humans.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Elliott M. Lee
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine
| | - Hayden Griffin
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine
| | - Nels C. Elde
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine
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27
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Wit J, Gilleard JS. Resequencing Helminth Genomes for Population and Genetic Studies. Trends Parasitol 2017; 33:388-399. [DOI: 10.1016/j.pt.2017.01.009] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/07/2016] [Revised: 01/11/2017] [Accepted: 01/12/2017] [Indexed: 10/20/2022]
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28
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Rotwein P. Variation in the Insulin-Like Growth Factor 1 Gene in Primates. Endocrinology 2017; 158:804-814. [PMID: 28324014 PMCID: PMC5460808 DOI: 10.1210/en.2016-1920] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/11/2016] [Accepted: 01/13/2017] [Indexed: 12/21/2022]
Abstract
Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF1) is a multifunctional peptide that is involved in a wide range of physiological and pathophysiological processes in many animal species, ranging from somatic growth in children to metabolism and tissue regeneration and repair in adults. The IGF1 gene is under multifactorial regulation in the few species in which it has been studied, with major control being exerted by growth hormone through a gene expression pathway involving inducible binding of the STAT5b transcription factor to dispersed enhancer elements. In this study, using resources available in public genomic databases, genes encoding IGF1 have been analyzed in a cohort of six nonhuman primate species representing >60 million years of evolutionary diversification from a common ancestor: chimpanzee, gorilla, macaque, olive baboon, marmoset, and mouse lemur. The IGF1 gene has been well conserved among these primates. Similar to human IGF1, each gene appears to be composed of six exons and five introns, and contains recognizable tandem promoters, each with a unique leader exon. Exon and intron lengths are very similar, and DNA sequence conservation is high, not only in orthologous exons and promoter regions, but also in putative growth hormone-activated STAT5b-binding enhancers that are found in analogous locations in IGF1 intron 3 and in 5' distal intergenic DNA. Taken together, the high level of organizational and nucleotide sequence similarity in the IGF1 gene and locus among these seven species supports the contention that common regulatory paradigms had existed prior to the onset of primate speciation >85 million years ago.
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Affiliation(s)
- Peter Rotwein
- Department of Biomedical Sciences, Paul L. Foster School of Medicine, Texas Tech Health University Health Sciences Center, El Paso, Texas 79905
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29
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Functional and Evolutionary Analyses Identify Proteolysis as a General Mechanism for NLRP1 Inflammasome Activation. PLoS Pathog 2016; 12:e1006052. [PMID: 27926929 PMCID: PMC5142783 DOI: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1006052] [Citation(s) in RCA: 94] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/03/2016] [Accepted: 11/09/2016] [Indexed: 12/19/2022] Open
Abstract
Inflammasomes are cytosolic multi-protein complexes that initiate immune responses to infection by recruiting and activating the Caspase-1 protease. Human NLRP1 was the first protein shown to form an inflammasome, but its physiological mechanism of activation remains unknown. Recently, specific variants of mouse and rat NLRP1 were found to be activated upon N-terminal cleavage by the anthrax lethal factor protease. However, agonists for other NLRP1 variants, including human NLRP1, are not known, and it remains unclear if they are also activated by proteolysis. Here we demonstrate that two mouse NLRP1 paralogs (NLRP1AB6 and NLRP1BB6) are also activated by N-terminal proteolytic cleavage. We also demonstrate that proteolysis within a specific N-terminal linker region is sufficient to activate human NLRP1. Evolutionary analysis of primate NLRP1 shows the linker/cleavage region has evolved under positive selection, indicative of pathogen-induced selective pressure. Collectively, these results identify proteolysis as a general mechanism of NLRP1 inflammasome activation that appears to be contributing to the rapid evolution of NLRP1 in rodents and primates.
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30
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Su Z, Zhang J, Kumar C, Molony C, Lu H, Chen R, Stone DJ, Ling F, Liu X. Species specific exome probes reveal new insights in positively selected genes in nonhuman primates. Sci Rep 2016; 6:33876. [PMID: 27659771 PMCID: PMC5034232 DOI: 10.1038/srep33876] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/15/2016] [Accepted: 09/05/2016] [Indexed: 01/20/2023] Open
Abstract
Nonhuman primates (NHP) are important biomedical animal models for the study of human disease. Of these, the most widely used models in biomedical research currently are from the genus Macaca. However, evolutionary genetic divergence between human and NHP species makes human-based probes inefficient for the capture of genomic regions of NHP for sequencing and study. Here we introduce a new method to resequence the exome of NHP species by a designed capture approach specifically targeted to the NHP, and demonstrate its superior performance on four NHP species or subspecies. Detailed investigation on biomedically relevant genes demonstrated superior capture by the new approach. We identified 28 genes that appeared to be pseudogenized and inactivated in macaque. Finally, we identified 187 genes showing strong evidence for positive selection across all branches of the primate phylogeny including many novel findings.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zheng Su
- BGI-Shenzhen, Shenzhen, Guangdong 518083, China
| | - Junjie Zhang
- Shool of bioscience &bioengineering, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510006, China
| | - Chanchal Kumar
- Translational Medicine Research Centre, Merck Research Laboratories, MSD, 8 Biomedical Grove, Neuros #04-01, Singapore 138665, Singapore
| | - Cliona Molony
- Merck Research Laboratories, Merck &Co. Inc., 33 Avenue Louis Pasteur, Boston, MA 02115, USA
| | - Hongchao Lu
- Informatics IT, MSD R&D (China) Co., Ltd., Beijing, China
| | - Ronghua Chen
- Informatics IT, MSD R&D (China) Co., Ltd., Beijing, China.,Informatics IT, Merck &Co., Inc., Boston, MA, USA
| | - David J Stone
- Merck Research Laboratories, Merck &Co. Inc., 770 Sumneytown Pike, WP53B-120 West Point, PA 19486, USA
| | - Fei Ling
- Shool of bioscience &bioengineering, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, Guangdong 510006, China
| | - Xiao Liu
- BGI-Shenzhen, Shenzhen, Guangdong 518083, China.,Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen 2200, Denmark
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31
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Giuliani C, Sazzini M, Bacalini MG, Pirazzini C, Marasco E, Fontanesi E, Franceschi C, Luiselli D, Garagnani P. Epigenetic Variability across Human Populations: A Focus on DNA Methylation Profiles of the KRTCAP3, MAD1L1 and BRSK2 Genes. Genome Biol Evol 2016; 8:2760-73. [PMID: 27503294 PMCID: PMC5630933 DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evw186] [Citation(s) in RCA: 28] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/14/2022] Open
Abstract
Natural epigenetic diversity has been suggested as a key mechanism in microevolutionary processes due to its capability to create phenotypic variability within individuals and populations. It constitutes an important reservoir of variation potentially useful for rapid adaptation in response to environmental stimuli. The analysis of population epigenetic structure represents a possible tool to study human adaptation and to identify external factors that are able to naturally shape human DNA methylation variability. The aim of this study is to investigate the dynamics that create epigenetic diversity between and within different human groups. To this end, we first used publicly available epigenome-wide data to explore population-specific DNA methylation changes that occur at macro-geographic scales. Results from this analysis suggest that nutrients, UVA exposure and pathogens load might represent the main environmental factors able to shape DNA methylation profiles. Then, we evaluated DNA methylation of candidate genes (KRTCAP3, MAD1L1, and BRSK2), emerged from the previous analysis, in individuals belonging to different populations from Morocco, Nigeria, Philippines, China, and Italy, but living in the same Italian city. DNA methylation of the BRSK2 gene is significantly different between Moroccans and Nigerians (pairwise t-test: CpG 6 P-value = 5.2*10 (-) (3); CpG 9 P-value = 2.6*10 (-) (3); CpG 10 P-value = 3.1*10 (-) (3); CpG 11 P-value = 2.8*10 (-) (3)). Comprehensively, these results suggest that DNA methylation diversity is a source of variability in human groups at macro and microgeographical scales and that population demographic and adaptive histories, as well as the individual ancestry, actually influence DNA methylation profiles.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cristina Giuliani
- Department of Biological Geological and Environmental Sciences, Laboratory of Molecular Anthropology & Centre for Genome Biology, University of Bologna, Italy
| | - Marco Sazzini
- Department of Biological Geological and Environmental Sciences, Laboratory of Molecular Anthropology & Centre for Genome Biology, University of Bologna, Italy
| | - Maria Giulia Bacalini
- Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine (DIMES), University of Bologna, Italy Interdepartmental Center "L. Galvani" (C.I.G.), University of Bologna, Italy
| | - Chiara Pirazzini
- Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine (DIMES), University of Bologna, Italy Interdepartmental Center "L. Galvani" (C.I.G.), University of Bologna, Italy
| | - Elena Marasco
- Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine (DIMES), University of Bologna, Italy Interdepartmental Center "L. Galvani" (C.I.G.), University of Bologna, Italy
| | - Elisa Fontanesi
- Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine (DIMES), University of Bologna, Italy
| | - Claudio Franceschi
- Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine (DIMES), University of Bologna, Italy Interdepartmental Center "L. Galvani" (C.I.G.), University of Bologna, Italy IRCCS Institute of Neurological Sciences, Bologna, Italy
| | - Donata Luiselli
- Department of Biological Geological and Environmental Sciences, Laboratory of Molecular Anthropology & Centre for Genome Biology, University of Bologna, Italy
| | - Paolo Garagnani
- Department of Experimental, Diagnostic and Specialty Medicine (DIMES), University of Bologna, Italy Interdepartmental Center "L. Galvani" (C.I.G.), University of Bologna, Italy Center for Applied Biomedical Research (CRBA), St. Orsola-Malpighi University Hospital, Bologna, Italy
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32
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Gasc C, Peyretaillade E, Peyret P. Sequence capture by hybridization to explore modern and ancient genomic diversity in model and nonmodel organisms. Nucleic Acids Res 2016; 44:4504-18. [PMID: 27105841 PMCID: PMC4889952 DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkw309] [Citation(s) in RCA: 52] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/28/2016] [Revised: 04/07/2016] [Accepted: 04/12/2016] [Indexed: 12/25/2022] Open
Abstract
The recent expansion of next-generation sequencing has significantly improved biological research. Nevertheless, deep exploration of genomes or metagenomic samples remains difficult because of the sequencing depth and the associated costs required. Therefore, different partitioning strategies have been developed to sequence informative subsets of studied genomes. Among these strategies, hybridization capture has proven to be an innovative and efficient tool for targeting and enriching specific biomarkers in complex DNA mixtures. It has been successfully applied in numerous areas of biology, such as exome resequencing for the identification of mutations underlying Mendelian or complex diseases and cancers, and its usefulness has been demonstrated in the agronomic field through the linking of genetic variants to agricultural phenotypic traits of interest. Moreover, hybridization capture has provided access to underexplored, but relevant fractions of genomes through its ability to enrich defined targets and their flanking regions. Finally, on the basis of restricted genomic information, this method has also allowed the expansion of knowledge of nonreference species and ancient genomes and provided a better understanding of metagenomic samples. In this review, we present the major advances and discoveries permitted by hybridization capture and highlight the potency of this approach in all areas of biology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Cyrielle Gasc
- EA 4678 CIDAM, Université d'Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand, 63001, France
| | | | - Pierre Peyret
- EA 4678 CIDAM, Université d'Auvergne, Clermont-Ferrand, 63001, France
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33
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Barber MF, Kronenberg Z, Yandell M, Elde NC. Antimicrobial Functions of Lactoferrin Promote Genetic Conflicts in Ancient Primates and Modern Humans. PLoS Genet 2016; 12:e1006063. [PMID: 27203426 PMCID: PMC4874600 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1006063] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/08/2016] [Accepted: 04/27/2016] [Indexed: 01/10/2023] Open
Abstract
Lactoferrin is a multifunctional mammalian immunity protein that limits microbial growth through sequestration of nutrient iron. Additionally, lactoferrin possesses cationic protein domains that directly bind and inhibit diverse microbes. The implications for these dual functions on lactoferrin evolution and genetic conflicts with microbes remain unclear. Here we show that lactoferrin has been subject to recurrent episodes of positive selection during primate divergence predominately at antimicrobial peptide surfaces consistent with long-term antagonism by bacteria. An abundant lactoferrin polymorphism in human populations and Neanderthals also exhibits signatures of positive selection across primates, linking ancient host-microbe conflicts to modern human genetic variation. Rapidly evolving sites in lactoferrin further correspond to molecular interfaces with opportunistic bacterial pathogens causing meningitis, pneumonia, and sepsis. Because microbes actively target lactoferrin to acquire iron, we propose that the emergence of antimicrobial activity provided a pivotal mechanism of adaptation sparking evolutionary conflicts via acquisition of new protein functions. Immunity genes can evolve rapidly in response to antagonism by microbial pathogens, but how the emergence of new protein functions impacts such evolutionary conflicts remains unclear. Here we have traced the evolutionary history of the lactoferrin gene in primates, which in addition to an ancient iron-binding function, acquired antimicrobial peptide activity in mammals. We show that, in contrast to the related gene transferrin, lactoferrin has rapidly evolved at protein domains that mediate iron-independent antimicrobial functions. We also pinpoint signatures of natural selection acting on lactoferrin in human populations, suggesting that lactoferrin genetic diversity has impacted the evolutionary success of both ancient primates and humans. Our work demonstrates how the emergence of new host immune protein functions can drastically alter evolutionary and molecular interactions with microbes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Matthew F Barber
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America
| | - Zev Kronenberg
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America
| | - Mark Yandell
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America
| | - Nels C Elde
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America
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34
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Efficient Genome-Wide Sequencing and Low-Coverage Pedigree Analysis from Noninvasively Collected Samples. Genetics 2016; 203:699-714. [PMID: 27098910 PMCID: PMC4896188 DOI: 10.1534/genetics.116.187492] [Citation(s) in RCA: 59] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/25/2016] [Accepted: 04/18/2016] [Indexed: 12/31/2022] Open
Abstract
Research on the genetics of natural populations was revolutionized in the 1990s by methods for genotyping noninvasively collected samples. However, these methods have remained largely unchanged for the past 20 years and lag far behind the genomics era. To close this gap, here we report an optimized laboratory protocol for genome-wide capture of endogenous DNA from noninvasively collected samples, coupled with a novel computational approach to reconstruct pedigree links from the resulting low-coverage data. We validated both methods using fecal samples from 62 wild baboons, including 48 from an independently constructed extended pedigree. We enriched fecal-derived DNA samples up to 40-fold for endogenous baboon DNA and reconstructed near-perfect pedigree relationships even with extremely low-coverage sequencing. We anticipate that these methods will be broadly applicable to the many research systems for which only noninvasive samples are available. The lab protocol and software (“WHODAD”) are freely available at www.tung-lab.org/protocols-and-software.html and www.xzlab.org/software.html, respectively.
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35
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Cornish AS, Gibbs RM, Norgren RB. Exome screening to identify loss-of-function mutations in the rhesus macaque for development of preclinical models of human disease. BMC Genomics 2016; 17:170. [PMID: 26935327 PMCID: PMC4776415 DOI: 10.1186/s12864-016-2509-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/23/2015] [Accepted: 02/22/2016] [Indexed: 02/02/2023] Open
Abstract
Background Exome sequencing has been utilized to identify genetic variants associated with disease in humans. Identification of loss-of-function mutations with exome sequencing in rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) could lead to valuable animal models of genetic disease. Attempts have been made to identify variants in rhesus macaques by aligning exome data against the rheMac2 draft genome. However, such efforts have been impaired due to the incompleteness and annotation errors associated with rheMac2. We wished to determine whether aligning exome reads against our new, improved rhesus genome, MacaM, could be used to identify high impact, loss-of-function mutations in rhesus macaques that would be relevant to human disease. Results We compared alignments of exome reads from four rhesus macaques, the reference animal and three unrelated animals, against rheMac2 and MacaM. Substantially more reads aligned against MacaM than rheMac2. We followed the Broad Institute’s Best Practice guidelines for variant discovery which utilizes the Genome Analysis Toolkit to identify high impact mutations. When rheMac2 was used as the reference genome, a large number of apparent false positives were identified. When MacaM was used as the reference genome, the number of false positives was greatly reduced. After examining the variant analyses conducted with MacaM as reference genome, we identified two putative loss-of-function mutations, in the heterozygous state, in genes related to human health. Sanger sequencing confirmed the presence of these mutations. We followed the transmission of one of these mutations (in the butyrylthiocholine gene) through three generations of rhesus macaques. Further, we demonstrated a functional decrease in butyrylthiocholinesterase activity similar to that observed in human heterozygotes with loss-of-function mutations in the same gene. Conclusions The new MacaM genome can be effectively utilized to identify loss-of-function mutations in rhesus macaques without generating a high level of false positives. In some cases, heterozygotes may be immediately useful as models of human disease. For diseases where homozygous mutants are needed, directed breeding of loss-of-function heterozygous animals could be used to create rhesus macaque models of human genetic disease. The approach we describe here could be applied to other mammals, but only if their genomes have been improved beyond draft status. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12864-016-2509-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
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Affiliation(s)
- Adam S Cornish
- Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Anatomy, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, 68198-5805, Nebraska.
| | - Robert M Gibbs
- Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Anatomy, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, 68198-5805, Nebraska.
| | - Robert B Norgren
- Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Anatomy, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha, 68198-5805, Nebraska.
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36
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Abstract
Inflammasomes are cytosolic protein complexes that serve as platforms for the recruitment and activation of the pro-inflammatory CASPASE-1 protease. CASPASE-1 activation leads to processing and maturation of the cytokines interleukin-1β and interleukin-18 and a lytic form of cell death termed pyroptosis. Inflammasome assembly is initiated by cytosolic sensors in response to microbial infections. Many of these sensors, including NLRP1 (NLR family, pyrin domain containing 1), are described to form an inflammasome, but until recently, the mechanism of inflammasome activation and its physiological functions in host defense have remained unclear. In the last few years, important advances in our understanding of NLRP1 biology have been achieved. In this review, we discuss the activation of NLRP1 by various stimuli, including Bacillus anthracis lethal toxin, Toxoplasma gondii, muramyl dipeptide, and host intracellular ATP depletion. The role NLRP1 plays in pathogen recognition and resistance during infection is also discussed, as is the regulation of NLRP1 by host and viral proteins. We conclude by discussing the unexpected differences in the mechanism of NLRP1 inflammasome activation, as compared to the activation of other inflammasomes, such as the NAIP (NLR family, apoptosis inhibitory protein)/NLRC4 inflammasomes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joseph Chavarría-Smith
- Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA
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37
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Jones MR, Good JM. Targeted capture in evolutionary and ecological genomics. Mol Ecol 2016; 25:185-202. [PMID: 26137993 PMCID: PMC4823023 DOI: 10.1111/mec.13304] [Citation(s) in RCA: 203] [Impact Index Per Article: 25.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/11/2015] [Revised: 06/19/2015] [Accepted: 06/24/2015] [Indexed: 12/17/2022]
Abstract
The rapid expansion of next-generation sequencing has yielded a powerful array of tools to address fundamental biological questions at a scale that was inconceivable just a few years ago. Various genome-partitioning strategies to sequence select subsets of the genome have emerged as powerful alternatives to whole-genome sequencing in ecological and evolutionary genomic studies. High-throughput targeted capture is one such strategy that involves the parallel enrichment of preselected genomic regions of interest. The growing use of targeted capture demonstrates its potential power to address a range of research questions, yet these approaches have yet to expand broadly across laboratories focused on evolutionary and ecological genomics. In part, the use of targeted capture has been hindered by the logistics of capture design and implementation in species without established reference genomes. Here we aim to (i) increase the accessibility of targeted capture to researchers working in nonmodel taxa by discussing capture methods that circumvent the need of a reference genome, (ii) highlight the evolutionary and ecological applications where this approach is emerging as a powerful sequencing strategy and (iii) discuss the future of targeted capture and other genome-partitioning approaches in the light of the increasing accessibility of whole-genome sequencing. Given the practical advantages and increasing feasibility of high-throughput targeted capture, we anticipate an ongoing expansion of capture-based approaches in evolutionary and ecological research, synergistic with an expansion of whole-genome sequencing.
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Affiliation(s)
- Matthew R. Jones
- University of Montana, Division of Biological Sciences, 32 Campus Dr. HS104, Missoula, MT 59812, USA
| | - Jeffrey M. Good
- University of Montana, Division of Biological Sciences, 32 Campus Dr. HS104, Missoula, MT 59812, USA
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Hirbo J, Eidem H, Rokas A, Abbot P. Integrating Diverse Types of Genomic Data to Identify Genes that Underlie Adverse Pregnancy Phenotypes. PLoS One 2015; 10:e0144155. [PMID: 26641094 PMCID: PMC4671692 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0144155] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/24/2015] [Accepted: 11/14/2015] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
Progress in understanding complex genetic diseases has been bolstered by synthetic approaches that overlay diverse data types and analyses to identify functionally important genes. Pre-term birth (PTB), a major complication of pregnancy, is a leading cause of infant mortality worldwide. A major obstacle in addressing PTB is that the mechanisms controlling parturition and birth timing remain poorly understood. Integrative approaches that overlay datasets derived from comparative genomics with function-derived ones have potential to advance our understanding of the genetics of birth timing, and thus provide insights into the genes that may contribute to PTB. We intersected data from fast evolving coding and non-coding gene regions in the human and primate lineage with data from genes expressed in the placenta, from genes that show enriched expression only in the placenta, as well as from genes that are differentially expressed in four distinct PTB clinical subtypes. A large fraction of genes that are expressed in placenta, and differentially expressed in PTB clinical subtypes (23–34%) are fast evolving, and are associated with functions that include adhesion neurodevelopmental and immune processes. Functional categories of genes that express fast evolution in coding regions differ from those linked to fast evolution in non-coding regions. Finally, there is a surprising lack of overlap between fast evolving genes that are differentially expressed in four PTB clinical subtypes. Integrative approaches, especially those that incorporate evolutionary perspectives, can be successful in identifying potential genetic contributions to complex genetic diseases, such as PTB.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jibril Hirbo
- Department of Biological Sciences, Vanderbilt University, Box 35164 Station B, Nashville, TN, 37235–1634, United States of America
| | - Haley Eidem
- Department of Biological Sciences, Vanderbilt University, Box 35164 Station B, Nashville, TN, 37235–1634, United States of America
| | - Antonis Rokas
- Department of Biological Sciences, Vanderbilt University, Box 35164 Station B, Nashville, TN, 37235–1634, United States of America
| | - Patrick Abbot
- Department of Biological Sciences, Vanderbilt University, Box 35164 Station B, Nashville, TN, 37235–1634, United States of America
- * E-mail:
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van der Lee R, Feng Q, Langereis MA, ter Horst R, Szklarczyk R, Netea MG, Andeweg AC, van Kuppeveld FJM, Huynen MA. Integrative Genomics-Based Discovery of Novel Regulators of the Innate Antiviral Response. PLoS Comput Biol 2015; 11:e1004553. [PMID: 26485378 PMCID: PMC4618338 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1004553] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/03/2015] [Accepted: 09/12/2015] [Indexed: 01/16/2023] Open
Abstract
The RIG-I-like receptor (RLR) pathway is essential for detecting cytosolic viral RNA to trigger the production of type I interferons (IFNα/β) that initiate an innate antiviral response. Through systematic assessment of a wide variety of genomics data, we discovered 10 molecular signatures of known RLR pathway components that collectively predict novel members. We demonstrate that RLR pathway genes, among others, tend to evolve rapidly, interact with viral proteins, contain a limited set of protein domains, are regulated by specific transcription factors, and form a tightly connected interaction network. Using a Bayesian approach to integrate these signatures, we propose likely novel RLR regulators. RNAi knockdown experiments revealed a high prediction accuracy, identifying 94 genes among 187 candidates tested (~50%) that affected viral RNA-induced production of IFNβ. The discovered antiviral regulators may participate in a wide range of processes that highlight the complexity of antiviral defense (e.g. MAP3K11, CDK11B, PSMA3, TRIM14, HSPA9B, CDC37, NUP98, G3BP1), and include uncharacterized factors (DDX17, C6orf58, C16orf57, PKN2, SNW1). Our validated RLR pathway list (http://rlr.cmbi.umcn.nl/), obtained using a combination of integrative genomics and experiments, is a new resource for innate antiviral immunity research.
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Affiliation(s)
- Robin van der Lee
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud university medical center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
| | - Qian Feng
- Virology Division, Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - Martijn A. Langereis
- Virology Division, Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - Rob ter Horst
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud university medical center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
| | - Radek Szklarczyk
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud university medical center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
| | - Mihai G. Netea
- Department of Internal Medicine and Radboud Center for Infectious Diseases, Radboud university medical center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
| | - Arno C. Andeweg
- Department of Viroscience, Erasmus Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Frank J. M. van Kuppeveld
- Virology Division, Department of Infectious Diseases and Immunology, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands
| | - Martijn A. Huynen
- Centre for Molecular and Biomolecular Informatics, Radboud Institute for Molecular Life Sciences, Radboud university medical center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands
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Haasl RJ, Payseur BA. Fifteen years of genomewide scans for selection: trends, lessons and unaddressed genetic sources of complication. Mol Ecol 2015. [PMID: 26224644 DOI: 10.1111/mec.13339] [Citation(s) in RCA: 124] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/13/2022]
Abstract
Genomewide scans for natural selection (GWSS) have become increasingly common over the last 15 years due to increased availability of genome-scale genetic data. Here, we report a representative survey of GWSS from 1999 to present and find that (i) between 1999 and 2009, 35 of 49 (71%) GWSS focused on human, while from 2010 to present, only 38 of 83 (46%) of GWSS focused on human, indicating increased focus on nonmodel organisms; (ii) the large majority of GWSS incorporate interpopulation or interspecific comparisons using, for example F(ST), cross-population extended haplotype homozygosity or the ratio of nonsynonymous to synonymous substitutions; (iii) most GWSS focus on detection of directional selection rather than other modes such as balancing selection; and (iv) in human GWSS, there is a clear shift after 2004 from microsatellite markers to dense SNP data. A survey of GWSS meant to identify loci positively selected in response to severe hypoxic conditions support an approach to GWSS in which a list of a priori candidate genes based on potential selective pressures are used to filter the list of significant hits a posteriori. We also discuss four frequently ignored determinants of genomic heterogeneity that complicate GWSS: mutation, recombination, selection and the genetic architecture of adaptive traits. We recommend that GWSS methodology should better incorporate aspects of genomewide heterogeneity using empirical estimates of relevant parameters and/or realistic, whole-chromosome simulations to improve interpretation of GWSS results. Finally, we argue that knowledge of potential selective agents improves interpretation of GWSS results and that new methods focused on correlations between environmental variables and genetic variation can help automate this approach.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ryan J Haasl
- Department of Biology, University of Wisconsin-Platteville, 1 University Plaza, Platteville, WI, 53818, USA
| | - Bret A Payseur
- Laboratory of Genetics, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 425 Henry Mall, Madison, WI, 53706, USA
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Flores-López CA, Machado CA. Differences in inferred genome-wide signals of positive selection during the evolution of Trypanosoma cruzi and Leishmania spp. lineages: A result of disparities in host and tissue infection ranges? INFECTION GENETICS AND EVOLUTION 2015; 33:37-46. [DOI: 10.1016/j.meegid.2015.04.008] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/01/2014] [Revised: 03/19/2015] [Accepted: 04/09/2015] [Indexed: 01/21/2023]
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Abstract
The world of primate genomics is expanding rapidly in new and exciting ways owing to lowered costs and new technologies in molecular methods and bioinformatics. The primate order is composed of 78 genera and 478 species, including human. Taxonomic inferences are complex and likely a consequence of ongoing hybridization, introgression, and reticulate evolution among closely related taxa. Recently, we applied large-scale sequencing methods and extensive taxon sampling to generate a highly resolved phylogeny that affirms, reforms, and extends previous depictions of primate speciation. The next stage of research uses this phylogeny as a foundation for investigating genome content, structure, and evolution across primates. Ongoing and future applications of a robust primate phylogeny are discussed, highlighting advancements in adaptive evolution of genes and genomes, taxonomy and conservation management of endangered species, next-generation genomic technologies, and biomedicine.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jill Pecon-Slattery
- Laboratory of Genomic Diversity, National Cancer Institute, Frederick, Maryland 21702; Current Affiliation: Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, National Zoological Park, Front Royal, Virginia 22630;
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Hancks DC, Hartley MK, Hagan C, Clark NL, Elde NC. Overlapping Patterns of Rapid Evolution in the Nucleic Acid Sensors cGAS and OAS1 Suggest a Common Mechanism of Pathogen Antagonism and Escape. PLoS Genet 2015; 11:e1005203. [PMID: 25942676 PMCID: PMC4420275 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1005203] [Citation(s) in RCA: 56] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/20/2014] [Accepted: 04/10/2015] [Indexed: 01/09/2023] Open
Abstract
A diverse subset of pattern recognition receptors (PRRs) detects pathogen-associated nucleic acids to initiate crucial innate immune responses in host organisms. Reflecting their importance for host defense, pathogens encode various countermeasures to evade or inhibit these immune effectors. PRRs directly engaged by pathogen inhibitors often evolve under recurrent bouts of positive selection that have been described as molecular ‘arms races.’ Cyclic GMP-AMP synthase (cGAS) was recently identified as a key PRR. Upon binding cytoplasmic double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) from various viruses, cGAS generates the small nucleotide secondary messenger cGAMP to signal activation of innate defenses. Here we report an evolutionary history of cGAS with recurrent positive selection in the primate lineage. Recent studies indicate a high degree of structural similarity between cGAS and 2’-5’-oligoadenylate synthase 1 (OAS1), a PRR that detects double-stranded RNA (dsRNA), despite low sequence identity between the respective genes. We present comprehensive comparative evolutionary analysis of cGAS and OAS1 primate sequences and observe positive selection at nucleic acid binding interfaces and distributed throughout both genes. Our data revealed homologous regions with strong signatures of positive selection, suggesting common mechanisms employed by unknown pathogen encoded inhibitors and similar modes of evasion from antagonism. Our analysis of cGAS diversification also identified alternately spliced forms missing multiple sites under positive selection. Further analysis of selection on the OAS family in primates, which comprises OAS1, OAS2, OAS3 and OASL, suggests a hypothesis where gene duplications and domain fusion events result in paralogs that provide another means of escaping pathogen inhibitors. Together our comparative evolutionary analysis of cGAS and OAS provides new insights into distinct mechanisms by which key molecular sentinels of the innate immune system have adapted to circumvent viral-encoded inhibitors. A pathogen’s ability to infect new individuals within and across species is largely driven by its capacity to hijack cellular machinery and overcome the immune system. Pathogens have evolved multiple means to evade and shut down host immunity. Typically, mechanisms of inactivation involve direct interactions between host and pathogen factors. To escape inhibition over the course of generations, host factors frequently evolve in a manner that disrupts interactions at specific interfaces with pathogen factors. Likewise, pathogens adapt to restore such interactions, and these genetic tug-of-wars have been described as “molecular-arms races.” Here we focus on the adaptation of two critical host immune factors, cGAS and OAS that share identity in protein structures despite very limited genetic similarity. Our analysis identifies a variety of ways, including amino acid changes on protein surfaces, by which these host factors appear to escape pathogen-mediated inhibition. Surprisingly, some amino acid substitutions are located at equivalent sites suggesting that cGAS and OAS may have adapted to evade common pathogen encoded inhibitors. These data also identify protein surfaces that are targeted by viruses to inhibit host immunity. Taken together our results indicate the existence of critical, yet-to-be identified viral antagonists of cGAS and OAS.
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Affiliation(s)
- Dustin C Hancks
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America
| | - Melissa K Hartley
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America
| | - Celia Hagan
- Basic Sciences Division, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, Washington, United States of America
| | - Nathan L Clark
- Department of Computational and Systems Biology, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States of America
| | - Nels C Elde
- Department of Human Genetics, University of Utah School of Medicine, Salt Lake City, Utah, United States of America
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Schneider A, Henegar C, Day K, Absher D, Napolitano C, Silveira L, David VA, O’Brien SJ, Menotti-Raymond M, Barsh GS, Eizirik E. Recurrent evolution of melanism in South American felids. PLoS Genet 2015; 11:e1004892. [PMID: 25695801 PMCID: PMC4335015 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgen.1004892] [Citation(s) in RCA: 24] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/30/2014] [Accepted: 11/13/2014] [Indexed: 12/04/2022] Open
Abstract
Morphological variation in natural populations is a genomic test bed for studying the interface between molecular evolution and population genetics, but some of the most interesting questions involve non-model organisms that lack well annotated reference genomes. Many felid species exhibit polymorphism for melanism but the relative roles played by genetic drift, natural selection, and interspecies hybridization remain uncertain. We identify mutations of Agouti signaling protein (ASIP) or the Melanocortin 1 receptor (MC1R) as independent causes of melanism in three closely related South American species: the pampas cat (Leopardus colocolo), the kodkod (Leopardus guigna), and Geoffroy’s cat (Leopardus geoffroyi). To assess population level variation in the regions surrounding the causative mutations we apply genomic resources from the domestic cat to carry out clone-based capture and targeted resequencing of 299 kb and 251 kb segments that contain ASIP and MC1R, respectively, from 54 individuals (13–21 per species), achieving enrichment of ~500–2500-fold and ~150x coverage. Our analysis points to unique evolutionary histories for each of the three species, with a strong selective sweep in the pampas cat, a distinctive but short melanism-specific haplotype in the Geoffroy’s cat, and reduced nucleotide diversity for both ancestral and melanism-bearing chromosomes in the kodkod. These results reveal an important role for natural selection in a trait of longstanding interest to ecologists, geneticists, and the lay community, and provide a platform for comparative studies of morphological variation in other natural populations. Color polymorphism in closely related animal species provides an opportunity to study how the balance between natural selection and genetic drift shapes the evolution of appearance and form. The cat family, Felidae, is especially interesting; 13 of 37 extant species exhibit polymorphism for melanism, but evidence for any adaptive role is lacking, in part because the potential benefits of melanism to felid predators are not clear, and in part because the tools for genomic analysis of natural populations are limited. We identify the mutations responsible for melanism in three closely related South American wild felids, the pampas cat, the kodkod, and Geoffroy’s cat, then adapt a new approach for targeted genome sequencing to characterize molecular variation in the region surrounding each melanism mutation. We find that each mutation has developed independently, with strong evidence for natural selection in the black pampas cat, and reduced genetic variation in the entire population of kodkods. Our results demonstrate that some “black cats” are black not by chance, but by selection for a mutation that provides increased fitness.
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Affiliation(s)
- Alexsandra Schneider
- Laboratório de Biologia Genômica e Molecular, Faculdade de Biociências, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Porto Alegre, Brazil
| | - Corneliu Henegar
- HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology, Huntsville, Alabama, United States of America
| | - Kenneth Day
- HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology, Huntsville, Alabama, United States of America
| | - Devin Absher
- HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology, Huntsville, Alabama, United States of America
| | - Constanza Napolitano
- Laboratorio de Ecología Molecular & Instituto de Ecologia y Biodiversidad, Departamento de Ciencias Ecológicas, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile
| | - Leandro Silveira
- Jaguar Conservation Fund, Instituto Onça-Pintada, Mineiros, Goiás, Brazil
| | - Victor A. David
- Basic Research Laboratory, Frederick National Laboratory, Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute, Frederick, Maryland, United States of America
| | - Stephen J. O’Brien
- Theodosius Dobzhansky Center for Genome Informatics, St. Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russia
| | - Marilyn Menotti-Raymond
- Basic Research Laboratory, Frederick National Laboratory, Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute, Frederick, Maryland, United States of America
| | - Gregory S. Barsh
- HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology, Huntsville, Alabama, United States of America
- * E-mail: (GSB); (EE)
| | - Eduardo Eizirik
- Laboratório de Biologia Genômica e Molecular, Faculdade de Biociências, Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Porto Alegre, Brazil
- Instituto Pró-Carnívoros, Atibaia, São Paulo, Brazil
- * E-mail: (GSB); (EE)
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Gautam P, Chaurasia A, Bhattacharya A, Grover R, Mukerji M, Natarajan VT. Population diversity and adaptive evolution in keratinization genes: impact of environment in shaping skin phenotypes. Mol Biol Evol 2014; 32:555-73. [PMID: 25534032 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msu342] [Citation(s) in RCA: 15] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/20/2022] Open
Abstract
Several studies have demonstrated the role of climatic factors in shaping skin phenotypes, particularly pigmentation. Keratinization is another well-designed feature of human skin, which is involved in modulating transepidermal water loss (TEWL). Although this physiological process is closely linked to climate, presently it is not clear whether genetic diversity is observed in keratinization and whether this process also responds to the environmental pressure. To address this, we adopted a multipronged approach, which involved analysis of 1) copy number variations in diverse Indian and HapMap populations from varied geographical regions; 2) genetic association with geoclimatic parameters in 61 populations of dbCLINE database in a set of 549 genes from four processes namely keratinization, pigmentation, epidermal differentiation, and housekeeping functions; 3) sequence divergence in 4,316 orthologous promoters and corresponding exonic regions of human and chimpanzee with macaque as outgroup, and 4) protein sequence divergence (Ka/Ks) across nine vertebrate classes, which differ in their extent of TEWL. Our analyses demonstrate that keratinization and epidermal differentiation genes are under accelerated evolution in the human lineage, relative to pigmentation and housekeeping genes. We show that this entire pathway may have been driven by environmental selection pressure through concordant functional polymorphisms across several genes involved in skin keratinization. Remarkably, this underappreciated function of skin may be a crucial determinant of adaptation to diverse environmental pressures across world populations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Pramod Gautam
- Genomics and Molecular Medicine, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, India
| | - Amit Chaurasia
- Genomics and Molecular Medicine, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, India
| | - Aniket Bhattacharya
- Genomics and Molecular Medicine, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, India Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research, Delhi, India
| | - Ritika Grover
- Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research, Delhi, India Systems Biology Group, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, India
| | | | - Mitali Mukerji
- Genomics and Molecular Medicine, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, India Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research, Delhi, India
| | - Vivek T Natarajan
- Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research, Delhi, India Systems Biology Group, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, India
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Harrison PW, Jordan GE, Montgomery SH. SWAMP: Sliding Window Alignment Masker for PAML. Evol Bioinform Online 2014; 10:197-204. [PMID: 25525323 PMCID: PMC4251194 DOI: 10.4137/ebo.s18193] [Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/26/2014] [Revised: 08/21/2014] [Accepted: 09/01/2014] [Indexed: 01/04/2023] Open
Abstract
With the greater availability of genetic data, large genome-wide scans for positive selection increasingly incorporate data from a range of sources. These data sets may be derived from different sequencing methods, each of which has potential sources of error. Sequencing errors, compounded by alignment errors, greatly increase the number of false positives in tests for adaptive evolution. Genome-wide analyses often fail to fully address these issues or to provide sufficient detail on postalignment masking/filtering. Here, we introduce a Sliding Window Alignment Masker for Phylogenetic Analysis by Maximum Likelihood (SWAMP) that scans multiple-sequence alignments for short regions enriched with unreasonably high rates of nonsynonymous substitutions caused, for example, by sequence or alignment errors. SWAMP prevents their inclusion in downstream evolutionary analyses and therefore increases the reliability of downstream analyses. It is able to effectively mask short stretches of erroneous sequence, particularly prevalent in low-coverage genomes, which may not be detected by existing methods based on filtering by sitewise conservation or alignment confidence. SWAMP offers a flexible masking approach, and the user can apply different masking regimens to specific branches or sequences in the phylogeny allowing the stringency of masking to vary according to branch length, expected divergence levels, or assembly quality. We exemplify SWAMPs effectiveness on a dataset of 6,379 protein-coding genes from primate species, including data of variable quality. Full reporting of the software parameters will further improve the reproducibility of genome-wide analyses, as well as reduce false-positive rates.
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Affiliation(s)
- Peter W Harrison
- Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, University College London, London, United Kingdom
| | - Gregory E Jordan
- European Molecular Biology Laboratory, European Bioinformatics Institute, Wellcome Trust Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridgeshire, United Kingdom
| | - Stephen H Montgomery
- Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, University College London, London, United Kingdom
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Dissecting the human protein-protein interaction network via phylogenetic decomposition. Sci Rep 2014; 4:7153. [PMID: 25412639 PMCID: PMC4239568 DOI: 10.1038/srep07153] [Citation(s) in RCA: 23] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/14/2014] [Accepted: 11/04/2014] [Indexed: 12/18/2022] Open
Abstract
The protein-protein interaction (PPI) network offers a conceptual framework for better understanding the functional organization of the proteome. However, the intricacy of network complexity complicates comprehensive analysis. Here, we adopted a phylogenic grouping method combined with force-directed graph simulation to decompose the human PPI network in a multi-dimensional manner. This network model enabled us to associate the network topological properties with evolutionary and biological implications. First, we found that ancient proteins occupy the core of the network, whereas young proteins tend to reside on the periphery. Second, the presence of age homophily suggests a possible selection pressure may have acted on the duplication and divergence process during the PPI network evolution. Lastly, functional analysis revealed that each age group possesses high specificity of enriched biological processes and pathway engagements, which could correspond to their evolutionary roles in eukaryotic cells. More interestingly, the network landscape closely coincides with the subcellular localization of proteins. Together, these findings suggest the potential of using conceptual frameworks to mimic the true functional organization in a living cell.
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Khan I, Maldonado E, Vasconcelos V, O'Brien SJ, Johnson WE, Antunes A. Mammalian keratin associated proteins (KRTAPs) subgenomes: disentangling hair diversity and adaptation to terrestrial and aquatic environments. BMC Genomics 2014; 15:779. [PMID: 25208914 PMCID: PMC4180150 DOI: 10.1186/1471-2164-15-779] [Citation(s) in RCA: 50] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/19/2014] [Accepted: 07/30/2014] [Indexed: 11/24/2022] Open
Abstract
Background Adaptation of mammals to terrestrial life was facilitated by the unique vertebrate trait of body hair, which occurs in a range of morphological patterns. Keratin associated proteins (KRTAPs), the major structural hair shaft proteins, are largely responsible for hair variation. Results We exhaustively characterized the KRTAP gene family in 22 mammalian genomes, confirming the existence of 30 KRTAP subfamilies evolving at different rates with varying degrees of diversification and homogenization. Within the two major classes of KRTAPs, the high cysteine (HS) subfamily experienced strong concerted evolution, high rates of gene conversion/recombination and high GC content. In contrast, high glycine-tyrosine (HGT) KRTAPs showed evidence of positive selection and low rates of gene conversion/recombination. Species with more hair and of higher complexity tended to have more KRATP genes (gene expansion). The sloth, with long and coarse hair, had the most KRTAP genes (175 with 141 being intact). By contrast, the “hairless” dolphin had 35 KRTAPs and the highest pseudogenization rate (74% relative to the 19% mammalian average). Unique hair-related phenotypes, such as scales (armadillo) and spines (hedgehog), were correlated with changes in KRTAPs. Gene expression variation probably also influences hair diversification patterns, for example human have an identical KRTAP repertoire as apes, but much less hair. Conclusions We hypothesize that differences in KRTAP gene repertoire and gene expression, together with distinct rates of gene conversion/recombination, pseudogenization and positive selection, are likely responsible for micro and macro-phenotypic hair diversification among mammals in response to adaptations to ecological pressures. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/1471-2164-15-779) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
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Affiliation(s)
| | | | | | | | | | - Agostinho Antunes
- CIMAR/CIIMAR, Centro Interdisciplinar de Investigação Marinha e Ambiental, Universidade do Porto, Rua dos Bragas 177, 4050-123 Porto, Portugal.
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49
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Improved variant calling accuracy by merging replicates in whole-exome sequencing studies. BIOMED RESEARCH INTERNATIONAL 2014; 2014:319534. [PMID: 25162009 PMCID: PMC4137624 DOI: 10.1155/2014/319534] [Citation(s) in RCA: 12] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/28/2014] [Revised: 07/15/2014] [Accepted: 07/15/2014] [Indexed: 12/30/2022]
Abstract
In large scale population-based whole-exome sequencing (WES) studies, there are some samples occasionally sequenced two or more times due to a variety of reasons. To investigate how to efficiently utilize these duplicated sequencing data, we conducted comprehensive evaluation of variant calling strategies. 92 samples subjected to WES twice were selected from a large population study. These 92 duplicated samples were divided into two groups: group H consisting of the higher sequencing depth for each subject and group L consisting of the lower depth for each subject. The merged samples for each subject were put in a third group M. Using the GATK multisample toolkit, we compared variant calling accuracy among three strategies. Hierarchical clustering analysis indicated that the two replicates for each subject showed high homogeneity. The comparative analyses on the basis of heterozygous-homozygous ratio (Hete/Homo), transition-transversion ratio (Ti/Tv), and overlapping rate with the 1000 Genomes Project consistently showed that the data quality of the SNPs detected from the M group was more accurate than that of SNPs detected from the H and L groups. These results suggested that merging homogeneous duplicated exomes instead of using one of them could improve variant calling accuracy.
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50
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Roux J, Privman E, Moretti S, Daub JT, Robinson-Rechavi M, Keller L. Patterns of positive selection in seven ant genomes. Mol Biol Evol 2014; 31:1661-85. [PMID: 24782441 PMCID: PMC4069625 DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msu141] [Citation(s) in RCA: 112] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/06/2023] Open
Abstract
The evolution of ants is marked by remarkable adaptations that allowed the development of very complex social systems. To identify how ant-specific adaptations are associated with patterns of molecular evolution, we searched for signs of positive selection on amino-acid changes in proteins. We identified 24 functional categories of genes which were enriched for positively selected genes in the ant lineage. We also reanalyzed genome-wide data sets in bees and flies with the same methodology to check whether positive selection was specific to ants or also present in other insects. Notably, genes implicated in immunity were enriched for positively selected genes in the three lineages, ruling out the hypothesis that the evolution of hygienic behaviors in social insects caused a major relaxation of selective pressure on immune genes. Our scan also indicated that genes implicated in neurogenesis and olfaction started to undergo increased positive selection before the evolution of sociality in Hymenoptera. Finally, the comparison between these three lineages allowed us to pinpoint molecular evolution patterns that were specific to the ant lineage. In particular, there was ant-specific recurrent positive selection on genes with mitochondrial functions, suggesting that mitochondrial activity was improved during the evolution of this lineage. This might have been an important step toward the evolution of extreme lifespan that is a hallmark of ants.
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Affiliation(s)
- Julien Roux
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, SwitzerlandSIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Eyal Privman
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, SwitzerlandSIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Sébastien Moretti
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, SwitzerlandSIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, SwitzerlandVital-IT Group, SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Josephine T Daub
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, SwitzerlandSIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, SwitzerlandCMPG, Institute of Ecology and Evolution, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland
| | - Marc Robinson-Rechavi
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, SwitzerlandSIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Laurent Keller
- Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
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