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Ali S, Abrar M, Hussain I, Batool F, Raza RZ, Khatoon H, Zoia M, Visel A, Shubin NH, Osterwalder M, Abbasi AA. Identification of ancestral gnathostome Gli3 enhancers with activity in mammals. Dev Growth Differ 2024; 66:75-88. [PMID: 37925606 PMCID: PMC10841732 DOI: 10.1111/dgd.12901] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/28/2023] [Revised: 09/01/2023] [Accepted: 10/23/2023] [Indexed: 11/06/2023]
Abstract
Abnormal expression of the transcriptional regulator and hedgehog (Hh) signaling pathway effector Gli3 is known to trigger congenital disease, most frequently affecting the central nervous system (CNS) and the limbs. Accurate delineation of the genomic cis-regulatory landscape controlling Gli3 transcription during embryonic development is critical for the interpretation of noncoding variants associated with congenital defects. Here, we employed a comparative genomic analysis on fish species with a slow rate of molecular evolution to identify seven previously unknown conserved noncoding elements (CNEs) in Gli3 intronic intervals (CNE15-21). Transgenic assays in zebrafish revealed that most of these elements drive activities in Gli3 expressing tissues, predominantly the fins, CNS, and the heart. Intersection of these CNEs with human disease associated SNPs identified CNE15 as a putative mammalian craniofacial enhancer, with conserved activity in vertebrates and potentially affected by mutation associated with human craniofacial morphology. Finally, comparative functional dissection of an appendage-specific CNE conserved in slowly evolving fish (elephant shark), but not in teleost (CNE14/hs1586) indicates co-option of limb specificity from other tissues prior to the divergence of amniotes and lobe-finned fish. These results uncover a novel subset of intronic Gli3 enhancers that arose in the common ancestor of gnathostomes and whose sequence components were likely gradually modified in other species during the process of evolutionary diversification.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shahid Ali
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, 45320, Islamabad Pakistan
- Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637, USA
| | - Muhammad Abrar
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, 45320, Islamabad Pakistan
| | - Irfan Hussain
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, 45320, Islamabad Pakistan
| | - Fatima Batool
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, 45320, Islamabad Pakistan
| | - Rabail Zehra Raza
- Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Multidisciplinary Studies, National University of Medical Sciences Rawalpindi, Pakistan
| | - Hizran Khatoon
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, 45320, Islamabad Pakistan
| | - Matteo Zoia
- Department for Biomedical Research (DBMR), University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland
| | - Axel Visel
- Environmental Genomics and System Biology Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 1 Cyclotron Road, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
- U.S. Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute, 1 Cyclotron Road, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA
- School of Natural Sciences, University of California, Merced, Merced, CA 95343, USA
| | - Neil H. Shubin
- Department of Organismal Biology and Anatomy, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60637, USA
| | - Marco Osterwalder
- Department for Biomedical Research (DBMR), University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland
- Department of Cardiology, Bern University Hospital, Bern, Switzerland
| | - Amir Ali Abbasi
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, 45320, Islamabad Pakistan
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Hussain I, Raza RZ, Ali S, Abrar M, Abbasi AA. Molecular signatures of selection on the human GLI3 associated central nervous system specific enhancers. Dev Genes Evol 2021; 231:21-32. [PMID: 33655411 DOI: 10.1007/s00427-021-00672-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/24/2020] [Accepted: 02/09/2021] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
Abstract
The zinc finger-containing transcription factor Gli3 is a key mediator of Hedgehog (Hh) signaling pathway. In vertebrates, Gli3 has widespread expression pattern during early embryonic development. Along the anteroposterior axes of the central nervous system (CNS), dorsoventral neural pattern elaboration is achieved through Hh mediated spatio-temporal deployment of Gli3 transcripts. Previously, we and others uncovered a set of enhancers that mediate many of the known aspects of Gli3 expression during neurogenesis. However, the potential role of Gli3 associated enhancers in trait evolution has not yet received any significant attention. Here, we investigate the evolutionary patterns of Gli3 associated CNS-specific enhancers that have been reported so far. A subset of these enhancers has undergone an accelerated rate of molecular evolution in the human lineage in comparison to other primates/mammals. These fast-evolving enhancers have acquired human-specific changes in transcription factor binding sites (TFBSs). These human-unique changes within subset of Gli3 associated CNS-specific enhancers were further validated as single nucleotide polymorphisms through 1000 Genome Project Phase 3 data. This work not only infers the molecular evolutionary patterns of Gli3 associated enhancers but also provides clues for putative genetic basis of the population-specificity of gene expression regulation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Irfan Hussain
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
| | - Rabail Zehra Raza
- Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Medical Sciences, The Mall, Rawalpindi, Pakistan
| | - Shahid Ali
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
| | - Muhammad Abrar
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
| | - Amir Ali Abbasi
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan.
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de Roo JJ, Staal FJ. Cell Signaling Pathway Reporters in Adult Hematopoietic Stem Cells. Cells 2020; 9:E2264. [PMID: 33050292 PMCID: PMC7599984 DOI: 10.3390/cells9102264] [Citation(s) in RCA: 9] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/01/2020] [Revised: 09/27/2020] [Accepted: 10/03/2020] [Indexed: 12/28/2022] Open
Abstract
Hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) develop at several anatomical locations and are thought to undergo different niche regulatory cues originating from highly conserved cell signaling pathways, such as Wnt, Notch, TGF-β family, and Hedgehog signaling. Most insight into these pathways has been obtained by reporter models and loss- or gain of function experiments, yet results differ in many cases according to the approach. In this review, we discuss existing murine reporter models regarding these pathways, considering the genetic constructs and reporter proteins in the context of HSC studies; yet these models are relevant for all other stem cell systems. Lastly, we describe a multi-reporter model to properly study and understand the cross-pathway interaction and how reporter models are highly valuable tools to understand complex signaling dynamics in stem cells.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Frank. J.T. Staal
- Department of Immunology, L3-Q, Leiden University Medical Center, 2333 ZA Leiden, The Netherlands;
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Wang Y, Sun Y, Huang Y, Pan Y, Shi B, Ma J, Ma L, Lan F, Zhou Y, Shi J, Zhu J, Jiang H, Zhang L, Xiao X, Jiang M, Yin A, Yu L, Wang L, Cheng J, Yang Y. The association study of nonsyndromic cleft lip with or without cleft palate identified risk variants of the GLI3 gene in a Chinese population. J Genet 2018; 96:687-693. [PMID: 28947718 DOI: 10.1007/s12041-017-0808-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/28/2022]
Abstract
Nonsyndromic cleft lip with or without cleft palate (NSCL/P) is a common birth defect due to abnormal orofacial development. Previous studies report abnormal sonic hedgehog (SHH) signalling activity during NSCL/P pathogenesis and propose several genes in the SHH pathway as candidate risk genes. As such, we focussed on GLI3, a downstream modulator of the SHH pathway. In the present study,we genotyped 34 tag SNPs covering GLI3 and performed association analysis with NSCL/P in 504 cases and 455 healthy controls. Our preliminary results identified risk variants of GLI3 that are associated with NSCL/P susceptibility in a Chinese population. In particular, rs3801161 and its haplotypes rs3801161-rs7785287 displayed significant association with NSCL/P and survived Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons. The robustness of the association between GLI3 and NSCL/P is worth further examination in the future across different populations.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yirui Wang
- Department of Biomedical Engineering, Medical Systems Biology Research Center, Tsinghua University School of Medicine, Beijing 100084, People's Republic of China.
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Abstract
PURPOSE OF REVIEW Cornelia de Lange syndrome (CdLS) is a rare genetic syndrome with clinical manifestations due to multiple affected organ systems including limbs, gastrointestinal, skin, and central nervous systems. Although the genetic basis of CdLS is now uncovered, how behavioral manifestations are associated with genetic and brain differences are less well understood. The current focused review systematically describes the main behavioral observations to date in individuals with CdLS, which have a significant impact on quality of life and adaptive functioning. RECENT FINDINGS The CdLS behavioral phenotype includes autistic traits as a prominent feature; however, brain imaging studies, required to understand gene-brain-behavior connections in CdLS, are scarce. Moreover, autistic features in CdLS have a greater emphasis on repetitive behaviors, including self-injurious behaviors (SIB) and expressive communication deficits, different that the core social deficit seen in idiopathic autism. Current data strongly support the use of CdLS as a model disease for repetitive behaviors and associated developmental delay manifestations. SUMMARY Behavioral phenotype characteristics in CdLS point to a preponderance of repetitive clinical phenomena as well as expressive verbal deficits that ought to inform specific treatment approaches in CdLS. In particular, repetitive behaviors associated with self-injury are of high negative impact on the quality of life for individuals with CdLS and their families. Treatment approaches geared to manage repetitive behaviors and self-injurious behaviors in CdLS are required in this developmental condition.
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Affiliation(s)
- Marco Grados
- Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Baltimore, MD
| | - Hassan Alvi
- Jinnah Sindh Medical University, Karachi, Pakistan
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Anwar S, Minhas R, Ali S, Lambert N, Kawakami Y, Elgar G, Azam SS, Abbasi AA. Identification and functional characterization of novel transcriptional enhancers involved in regulating human GLI3 expression during early development. Dev Growth Differ 2015; 57:570-80. [PMID: 26464005 PMCID: PMC4609622 DOI: 10.1111/dgd.12239] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [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] [Received: 05/04/2015] [Revised: 08/06/2015] [Accepted: 08/25/2015] [Indexed: 12/13/2022]
Abstract
The zinc-finger transcription factor GLI3 acts as a primary transducer of Sonic hedgehog (Shh) signaling in a context-dependent combinatorial fashion. GLI3 participates in the patterning and growth of many organs, including the central nervous system (CNS) and limbs. Previously, we reported a subset of human intronic cis-regulators controlling many known aspects of endogenous Gli3 expression in mouse and zebrafish. Here we demonstrate in a transgenic zebrafish assay the potential of two novel tetrapod-teleost conserved non-coding elements (CNEs) docking within GLI3 intronic intervals (intron 3 and 4) to induce reporter gene expression at known sites of endogenous Gli3 transcription in embryonic domains such as the central nervous system (CNS) and limbs. Interestingly, the cell culture based assays reveal harmony with the context dependent dual nature of intra-GLI3 conserved elements. Furthermore, a transgenic zebrafish assay of previously reported limb-specific GLI3 transcriptional enhancers (previously tested in mice and chicken limb buds) induced reporter gene expression in zebrafish blood precursor cells and notochord instead of fin. These results demonstrate that the appendage-specific activity of a subset of GLI3-associated enhancers might be a tetrapod innovation. Taken together with our recent data, these results suggest that during the course of vertebrate evolution Gli3 expression control acquired a complex cis-regulatory landscape for spatiotemporal patterning of CNS and limbs. Comparative data from fish and mice suggest that the functional aspects of a subset of these cis-regulators have diverged significantly between these two lineages.
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Affiliation(s)
- Saneela Anwar
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Computational Biology Lab, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
| | - Rashid Minhas
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
| | - Shahid Ali
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
| | - Nicholas Lambert
- Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, 55455, USA
| | - Yasuhiko Kawakami
- Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota, 55455, USA
| | - Greg Elgar
- The Francis Crick Institute, Mill Hill Laboratory, The Ridgeway, London, NW7 1AA, UK
| | - Syed Sikandar Azam
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Computational Biology Lab, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
| | - Amir Ali Abbasi
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, 45320, Pakistan
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Yousaf A, Sohail Raza M, Ali Abbasi A. The Evolution of Bony Vertebrate Enhancers at Odds with Their Coding Sequence Landscape. Genome Biol Evol 2015; 7:2333-43. [PMID: 26253316 PMCID: PMC4558863 DOI: 10.1093/gbe/evv146] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 12/21/2022] Open
Abstract
Enhancers lie at the heart of transcriptional and developmental gene regulation. Therefore, changes in enhancer sequences usually disrupt the target gene expression and result in disease phenotypes. Despite the well-established role of enhancers in development and disease, evolutionary sequence studies are lacking. The current study attempts to unravel the puzzle of bony vertebrates’ conserved noncoding elements (CNE) enhancer evolution. Bayesian phylogenetics of enhancer sequences spotlights promising interordinal relationships among placental mammals, proposing a closer relationship between humans and laurasiatherians while placing rodents at the basal position. Clock-based estimates of enhancer evolution provided a dynamic picture of interspecific rate changes across the bony vertebrate lineage. Moreover, coelacanth in the study augmented our appreciation of the vertebrate cis-regulatory evolution during water–land transition. Intriguingly, we observed a pronounced upsurge in enhancer evolution in land-dwelling vertebrates. These novel findings triggered us to further investigate the evolutionary trend of coding as well as CNE nonenhancer repertoires, to highlight the relative evolutionary dynamics of diverse genomic landscapes. Surprisingly, the evolutionary rates of enhancer sequences were clearly at odds with those of the coding and the CNE nonenhancer sequences during vertebrate adaptation to land, with land vertebrates exhibiting significantly reduced rates of coding sequence evolution in comparison to their fast evolving regulatory landscape. The observed variation in tetrapod cis-regulatory elements caused the fine-tuning of associated gene regulatory networks. Therefore, the increased evolutionary rate of tetrapods’ enhancer sequences might be responsible for the variation in developmental regulatory circuits during the process of vertebrate adaptation to land.
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Affiliation(s)
- Aisha Yousaf
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan
| | - Muhammad Sohail Raza
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan
| | - Amir Ali Abbasi
- National Center for Bioinformatics, Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics, Faculty of Biological Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan
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Minhas R, Pauls S, Ali S, Doglio L, Khan MR, Elgar G, Abbasi AA. Cis-regulatory control of human GLI2 expression in the developing neural tube and limb bud. Dev Dyn 2015; 244:681-92. [DOI: 10.1002/dvdy.24266] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/29/2014] [Revised: 01/29/2015] [Accepted: 02/16/2015] [Indexed: 11/08/2022] Open
Affiliation(s)
- Rashid Minhas
- National Center for Bioinformatics; Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics; Faculty of Biological Sciences; Quaid-i-Azam University; Islamabad 45320 Pakistan
| | - Stefan Pauls
- Division of Systems Biology; MRC National Institute for Medical Research; The Ridgeway, Mill Hill London NW7 1AA United Kingdom
| | - Shahid Ali
- National Center for Bioinformatics; Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics; Faculty of Biological Sciences; Quaid-i-Azam University; Islamabad 45320 Pakistan
| | - Laura Doglio
- Division of Systems Biology; MRC National Institute for Medical Research; The Ridgeway, Mill Hill London NW7 1AA United Kingdom
| | - Muhammad Ramzan Khan
- National Institute for Genomics and Advanced Biotechnology; National Agricultural Research Center; Park Road Islamabad Pakistan
| | - Greg Elgar
- Division of Systems Biology; MRC National Institute for Medical Research; The Ridgeway, Mill Hill London NW7 1AA United Kingdom
| | - Amir Ali Abbasi
- National Center for Bioinformatics; Program of Comparative and Evolutionary Genomics; Faculty of Biological Sciences; Quaid-i-Azam University; Islamabad 45320 Pakistan
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