Smed-betacatenin-1 is required for anteroposterior blastema polarity in planarian regeneration

Planarian flatworms can regenerate heads at anterior-facing wounds and tails at posterior-facing wounds throughout the body. How this regeneration polarity is specified has been a classic problem for more than a century. We identified a planarian gene, Smed-betacatenin-1, that controls regeneration polarity. Posterior-facing blastemas regenerate a head instead of a tail in Smed-betacatenin-1(RNAi) animals. Smed-betacatenin-1 is required after wounding and at any posterior-facing wound for polarity. Additionally, intact Smed-betacatenin-1(RNAi) animals display anteriorization during tissue turnover. Five Wnt genes and a secreted Frizzled-related Wnt antagonist-like gene are expressed in domains along the anteroposterior axis that reset to new positions during regeneration, which suggests that Wnts control polarity through Smed-betacatenin-1. Our data suggest that beta-catenin specifies the posterior character of the anteroposterior axis throughout the Bilateria and specifies regeneration polarity in planarians.     

Sea anemone genome reveals ancestral eumetazoan gene repertoire and genomic organization

Sea anemones are seemingly primitive animals that, along with corals, jellyfish, and hydras, constitute the oldest eumetazoan phylum, the Cnidaria. Here, we report a comparative analysis of the draft genome of an emerging cnidarian model, the starlet sea anemone Nematostella vectensis. The sea anemone genome is complex, with a gene repertoire, exon-intron structure, and large-scale gene linkage more similar to vertebrates than to flies or nematodes, implying that the genome of the eumetazoan ancestor was similarly complex. Nearly one-fifth of the inferred genes of the ancestor are eumetazoan novelties, which are enriched for animal functions like cell signaling, adhesion, and synaptic transmission. Analysis of diverse pathways suggests that these gene "inventions" along the lineage leading to animals were likely already well integrated with preexisting eukaryotic genes in the eumetazoan progenitor.     

Buddenbrockia is a cnidarian worm

A major evolutionary divide occurs in the animal kingdom between the so-called radially symmetric animals, which includes the cnidarians, and the bilaterally symmetric animals, which includes all worm phyla. Buddenbrockia plumatellae is an active, muscular, parasitic worm that belongs to the phylum Myxozoa, a group of morphologically simplified microscopic endoparasites that has proved difficult to place phylogenetically. Phylogenetic analyses of multiple protein-coding genes demonstrate that Buddenbrockia is a cnidarian. This active muscular worm increases the known diversity in cnidarian body plans and demonstrates that a muscular, wormlike form can evolve in the absence of overt bilateral symmetry.     

Acoel flatworms: earliest extant bilaterian Metazoans, not members of Platyhelminthes

Because of their simple organization the Acoela have been considered to be either primitive bilaterians or descendants of coelomates through secondary loss of derived features. Sequence data of 18S ribosomal DNA genes from non-fast evolving species of acoels and other metazoans reveal that this group does not belong to the Platyhelminthes but represents the extant members of the earliest divergent Bilateria, an interpretation that is supported by recent studies on the embryonic cleavage pattern and nervous system of acoels. This study has implications for understanding the evolution of major body plans, and for perceptions of the Cambrian evolutionary explosion.     

春黄菊族部分植物CYC2d同源基因的分离与功能初步分析

CYC同源基因作为控制花瓣对称性形成的关键基因,在菊科头状花序中主要调控着舌状花(两侧对称)的生长发育。菊科植物中舌状花的有或无及其分子调控机制和演化过程一直备受关注。本研究从花型不同的川甘亚菊、戈壁短舌菊和神农香菊中分别同源克隆了转录因子基因CYC2d。3个序列与菊花CmCYC2d基因氨基酸序列的比对结果显示其同源性均超过90%,且均含有保守的TCP和R结构域。半定量RT-qPCR结果显示,CYC2d在地被菊品种‘毛香玉’幼嫩花序中的表达量最高,而在川甘亚菊和戈壁短舌菊中的表达量非常微弱。因此,进一步通过实时荧光定量检测了CmCYC2d在‘毛香玉’6个发育时期舌状花和管状花中的表达情况,结果表明, CmCYC2d各个时期管状花中的表达量均很低,而在相应时期舌状花中的表达均很丰富。在不同花型的杂交F1代优株中,CmCYC2d也主要在不同位置的舌状花中高表达。通过农杆菌转化重组质粒pSUPER1300-CmCYC2d-GFP在烟草表皮细胞瞬时表达,亚细胞定位结果显示其定位于表皮细胞核。分别在野生型拟南芥和tcp1突变体(SALK-022364)中过表达CmCYC2d基因的结果表明,转基因阳性株系的营养生长受到抑制,花期延迟,花瓣大小和排列均发生了变化,使原本辐射对称的花瓣呈现两侧对称的趋势。从研究结果可知, 转录因子基因CmCYC2d对菊花舌状花的发育有重要调控作用。本研究为菊科舌状花演化的分子调控机制研究奠定了基础。      

Shaping the vertebrate body plan by polarized embryonic cell movements

Polarized cell movements shape the major features of the vertebrate body plan during development. The head-to-tail body axis of vertebrates is elongated in embryonic stages by "convergent extension" tissue movements. During these movements cells intercalate between one another transverse to the elongating body axis to form a narrower, longer array. Recent discoveries show that these polarized cell movements are controlled by homologs of genes that control the polarity of epithelial cells in the developing wing and eye of the fruit fly, Drosophila.     

Comparing brains

Some animals have larger brains than others, but it is not yet known why. Species differences in life-style, including dietary habits and patterns of development of the young, are associated with variation in brain weight, independently of the effects of body weight and evolutionary history. Taken together with behavioral and neuroanatomical analyses, these studies begin to suggest the evolutionary pressures that favor different sized brains and brain components.     

Ctenocystoidea: new class of primitive echinoderms

The oldest known "carpoids" of the echinoderm subphylum Homalozoa have been discovered in lower Middle Cambrian rocks of northern Utah. They were free-living benthonic animals characterized by a unique ctenoid feeding apparatus and flattened flexible theca with near bilateral symmetry. A new class, Ctenocystoidea, is proposed to include the new genus and new species, Ctenocystis utahensis.     

Emulating membrane protein evolution by rational design

How do integral membrane proteins evolve in size and complexity? Using the small multidrug-resistance protein EmrE from Escherichia coli as a model, we experimentally demonstrated that the evolution of membrane proteins composed of two homologous but oppositely oriented domains can occur in a small number of steps: An original dual-topology protein evolves, through a gene-duplication event, to a heterodimer formed by two oppositely oriented monomers. This simple evolutionary pathway can explain the frequent occurrence of membrane proteins with an internal pseudo-two-fold symmetry axis in the plane of the membrane.     

Retinoic acid controls the bilateral symmetry of somite formation in the mouse embryo

A striking characteristic of vertebrate embryos is their bilaterally symmetric body plan, which is particularly obvious at the level of the somites and their derivatives such as the vertebral column. Segmentation of the presomitic mesoderm must therefore be tightly coordinated along the left and right embryonic sides. We show that mutant mice defective for retinoic acid synthesis exhibit delayed somite formation on the right side. Asymmetric somite formation correlates with a left-right desynchronization of the segmentation clock oscillations. These data implicate retinoic acid as an endogenous signal that maintains the bilateral synchrony of mesoderm segmentation, and therefore controls bilateral symmetry, in vertebrate embryos.     

Small bilaterian fossils from 40 to 55 million years before the cambrian

Ten phosphatized specimens of a small (<180 micrometers) animal displaying clear bilaterian features have been recovered from the Doushantuo Formation, China, dating from 40 to 55 million years before the Cambrian. Seen in sections, this animal (Vernanimalcula guizhouena gen. et sp. nov.) had paired coeloms extending the length of the gut; paired external pits that could be sense organs; bilateral, anterior-posterior organization; a ventrally directed anterior mouth with thick walled pharynx; and a triploblastic structure. The structural complexity is that of an adult rather than a larval form. These fossils provide the first evidence confirming the phylogenetic inference that Bilateria arose well before the Cambrian.     

Evolutionarily assembled cis-regulatory module at a human ciliopathy locus

Neighboring genes are often coordinately expressed within cis-regulatory modules, but evidence that nonparalogous genes share functions in mammals is lacking. Here, we report that mutation of either TMEM138 or TMEM216 causes a phenotypically indistinguishable human ciliopathy, Joubert syndrome. Despite a lack of sequence homology, the genes are aligned in a head-to-tail configuration and joined by chromosomal rearrangement at the amphibian-to-reptile evolutionary transition. Expression of the two genes is mediated by a conserved regulatory element in the noncoding intergenic region. Coordinated expression is important for their interdependent cellular role in vesicular transport to primary cilia. Hence, during vertebrate evolution of genes involved in ciliogenesis, nonparalogous genes were arranged to a functional gene cluster with shared regulatory elements.     

番鸭就巢性状相关基因表达的cDNA-AFLP分析

【目的】寻找与番鸭就巢性状相关的表达基因,了解其就巢调控的分子机理。【方法】采用cDNA-AFLP (cDNA-amplified fragment length polymorphism)技术分析遗传背景相近的RF系白羽番鸭就巢个体和非就巢个体脑垂体基因表达差异。【结果】筛选到与就巢行为相关差异表达片段82条,选取其中15条进行测序。将测序结果在GenBank数据库进行BLAST比较和分析,发现 8个片段(53.3%)与已知基因具有较高同源性,涉及与繁殖性能紧密相关的下丘脑-垂体-性腺轴(hypothalamic-pituitary-gonadal,HPG)上的功能基因,如GnRH基因、FSH基因,同时也分离到位于GH／IGF轴上的功能基因,即GH基因;以及在功能上属于信号传导、转录调控、代谢的调节基因,如超氧化物歧化酶基因、角蛋白关联蛋白基因、硫氰酸酶释放硫基转移酶基因等。2个片段与未知功能的基因有同源性,5个与数据库中现有的基因没有明显的相似性。随机选择3个片段进行RT-PCR验证,检测片段的表达模式与cDNA-AFLP结果一致。【结论】揭示番鸭不同就巢性状基因表达调控模式,进一步阐明番鸭就巢的分子机理。     

Evolution of the gene network underlying wing polyphenism in ants

Wing polyphenism in ants evolved once, 125 million years ago, and has been a key to their amazing evolutionary success. We characterized the expression of several genes within the network underlying the wing primordia of reproductive (winged) and sterile (wingless) ant castes. We show that the expression of several genes within the network is conserved in the winged castes of four ant species, whereas points of interruption within the network in the wingless castes are evolutionarily labile. The simultaneous evolutionary lability and conservation of the network underlying wing development in ants may have played an important role in the morphological diversification of this group and may be a general feature of polyphenic development and evolution in plants and animals.     

薄壳山核桃全基因组LBD基因家族的生物信息学分析

  目的  研究薄壳山核桃Carya illinoensis LBD基因家族结构特征、进化模式和在胚发育过程中的表达模式。  方法  运用生物信息学手段鉴定薄壳山核桃LBD基因,分析该基因结构特征、系统发生学关系、显花植物中的进化历史和在胚发育过程中3个关键阶段的表达模式。  结果  薄壳山核桃全基因组中一共鉴定到52个候选LBD基因。根据基因结构、系统发生学最大似然树和Motif分析可分为3类:GroupⅠ、GroupⅡ和GroupⅢ。多序列比对分析中,52个LBD基因LOB结构域中鉴定出3个重要的结构:CX₂CX₆CX₃C锌指结构、高度保守的甘氨酸GAS结构和亮氨酸拉链(zipper-like)结构,并且在3类内都分别发生了特异性的的变异或者缺失。根据代表性显花植物LBD基因家族的系统发生学分析,从变异程度看GroupⅠ和GroupⅡ相对较为保守,而GroupⅢ内的所有LBD基因共享1支较长的分支,它们已发生了较大的变异,可能已经分化出新的功能。表达分析结果显示:LBD基因家族参与调控胚发育过程,通常控制子叶的发育和形态建成。薄壳山核桃LBD基因中又有在整个胚发育过程中都高表达的一簇基因,这些基因可能在胚发育过程中发挥了更加重要的作用。  结论  薄壳山核桃全基因组中共获得LBD基因52个,共可分为3个亚家族,不同的亚家族具有不同的基因结构、蛋白质结构、进化模式和表达模式,转录组表达分析显示:不同亚家族之间在胚发育不同阶段具有差异性表达,它们共同参与调控薄壳山核桃胚发育过程。图5表2参47     

Evolutionary and somatic selection of the antibody repertoire in the mouse

The repertoire of antibody variable (V) regions has been subject to evolutionary selection, affecting both the diversity of V region genes in the germline and their expression in the B lymphocyte population and its subsets. In ontogeny, contact with an antigen leads to the expansion of B cells expressing antibodies complementary to it. In a defined phase of B cell differentiation, new sets of V regions are generated from the existing repertoire through somatic hypermutation. Cells carrying advantageous antibody mutants are selected into the memory compartment and produce a stable secondary response upon reexposure to the antigen.     

mRNA差别显示技术及其在植物基因研究中的应用

mRNA差别显示技术是近年发展起来的一种用于分离和克隆正常与异常细胞之间差异表达基因的PCR方法 ,是目前筛选差异表达基因的有效方法之一 .自问世以来在动物遗传育种方面取得了很大的成绩 ,广泛用于人类及其他动物生长发育基因调控、基因克隆的研究 .在植物基因研究方面应用起步较晚 ,现已开始用于植物基因分析、杂种优势机理等方面的研究 .在此 ,该文介绍了mRNA差别显示技术的原理、步骤、优缺点及其发展 ,并对其在植物特异基因分离方面的研究及其应用前景做了探讨 .     

Neuronal geometry: determination with a technique of intracellular dye injection

In a study of the specificity of neuronal connections in lobster abdominal ganglia, the dye Procion Yellow M4RS was electrophoretically injected into identified cell bodies. This dye spreads into fine branches of cells, survives fixation and routine histological procedures, and permits the reconstruction of cell shapes through examination of serial sections of ganglia. Certain cells were found to have an internal bilateral symmetry. Repeated injection of the same cells in ganglia from different animals showed that cells have characteristic shapes and that the neuropil is highly structured. This method of dye injection should have general applicability in studies where a knowledge of the geometry of specific cells is important.