TY - JOUR
T1 - Evolutionary relationships among the members of an ancient class of non- LTR retrotransposons found in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans
AU - Marín, Ignacio
AU - Plata-Rengifo, Piedad
AU - Labrador, Mariano
AU - Fontdevila, Antonio
PY - 1998/1/1
Y1 - 1998/1/1
N2 - We took advantage of the massive amount of sequence information generated by the Caenorhabditis elegans genome project to perform a comprehensive analysis of a group of over 100 related sequences that has allowed us to describe two new C. elegans non-LTR retrotransposons. We named them Sam and Frodo. We also determined that several highly divergent subfamilies of both elements exist in C. elegans. It is likely that several master copies have been active at the same time in C. elegans, although only a few copies of both Sam and Frodo have characteristics that are compatible with them being active today. We discuss whether it is more appropriate under these circumstances to define only 2 elements corresponding to the most divergent groups of sequences or up to 16, considering each subfamily a different element. The C. elegans elements are related to other previously described non-LTR retrotransposons (CR1, found in different vertebrates; SR1, from the trematode Schistosoma; Q and T1, from the mosquito Anopheles). All of these elements, according to the analysis of their reverse transcriptases, form a monophyletic cluster that we call the 'T1/CR1 subgroup.' Elements of this subgroup are thus ancient components of the genome of animal species. However, we discuss the possibility that these elements may occasionally be horizontally transmitted.
AB - We took advantage of the massive amount of sequence information generated by the Caenorhabditis elegans genome project to perform a comprehensive analysis of a group of over 100 related sequences that has allowed us to describe two new C. elegans non-LTR retrotransposons. We named them Sam and Frodo. We also determined that several highly divergent subfamilies of both elements exist in C. elegans. It is likely that several master copies have been active at the same time in C. elegans, although only a few copies of both Sam and Frodo have characteristics that are compatible with them being active today. We discuss whether it is more appropriate under these circumstances to define only 2 elements corresponding to the most divergent groups of sequences or up to 16, considering each subfamily a different element. The C. elegans elements are related to other previously described non-LTR retrotransposons (CR1, found in different vertebrates; SR1, from the trematode Schistosoma; Q and T1, from the mosquito Anopheles). All of these elements, according to the analysis of their reverse transcriptases, form a monophyletic cluster that we call the 'T1/CR1 subgroup.' Elements of this subgroup are thus ancient components of the genome of animal species. However, we discuss the possibility that these elements may occasionally be horizontally transmitted.
KW - Caenorhabditis elegans
KW - Endonuclease
KW - Genome project
KW - Horizontal transmission
KW - Non-LTR retrotransposon
KW - Reverse transcriptase
U2 - 10.1093/oxfordjournals.molbev.a025867
DO - 10.1093/oxfordjournals.molbev.a025867
M3 - Article
VL - 15
SP - 1390
EP - 1402
JO - Molecular Biology and Evolution
JF - Molecular Biology and Evolution
SN - 0737-4038
IS - 11
ER -