The Evolutionary Landscape of Intergenic Trans-splicing Events in Insects

Overview

Journal Nat Commun

Specialty Biology

Date 2015 Nov 3

PMID 26521696

Citations 14

Authors

Yimeng Kong

Hongxia Zhou

Yao Yu

Longxian Chen

Pei Hao

Xuan Li

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

To explore the landscape of intergenic trans-splicing events and characterize their functions and evolutionary dynamics, we conduct a mega-data study of a phylogeny containing eight species across five orders of class Insecta, a model system spanning 400 million years of evolution. A total of 1,627 trans-splicing events involving 2,199 genes are identified, accounting for 1.58% of the total genes. Homology analysis reveals that mod(mdg4)-like trans-splicing is the only conserved event that is consistently observed in multiple species across two orders, which represents a unique case of functional diversification involving trans-splicing. Thus, evolutionarily its potential for generating proteins with novel function is not broadly utilized by insects. Furthermore, 146 non-mod trans-spliced transcripts are found to resemble canonical genes from different species. Trans-splicing preserving the function of 'breakup' genes may serve as a general mechanism for relaxing the constraints on gene structure, with profound implications for the evolution of genes and genomes.

Citing Articles

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Functional analysis and localisation of a thyrotropin-releasing hormone-type neuropeptide (EFLa) in hemipteran insects.

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