Experimental evidence for negative selection in the evolution of a Yersinia pestis pseudogene
Autor: | Creg Darby, B. Joseph Hinnebusch, Yi-Cheng Sun |
---|---|
Rok vydání: | 2008 |
Předmět: |
Yersinia pestis
Pseudogene Colony Count Microbial Biology medicine.disease_cause Models Biological Microbiology Evolution Molecular Negative selection Bacterial Proteins Genetic drift Molecular evolution medicine Animals Yersinia pseudotuberculosis Letters Selection Genetic Caenorhabditis elegans Genetics Mutation Multidisciplinary Biofilm biology.organism_classification Phenotype Amino Acid Substitution Biofilms Siphonaptera Pseudogenes Signal Transduction |
Zdroj: | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 105:8097-8101 |
ISSN: | 1091-6490 0027-8424 |
Popis: | Yersinia pestis , the agent of bubonic plague, evolved from the enteric pathogen Yersinia pseudotuberculosis within the past 20,000 years. Because ancestor and descendant both exist, it is possible to infer steps in molecular evolution by direct experimental approaches. The Y. pestis life cycle includes establishment of a biofilm within its vector, the flea. Although Y. pseudotuberculosis makes biofilms in other environments, it fails to do so in the insect. We show that rcsA , a negative regulator of biofilms that is functional in Y. pseudotuberculosis , is a pseudogene in Y. pestis . Replacement of the pseudogene with the functional Y. pseudotuberculosis rcsA allele strongly represses biofilm formation and essentially abolishes flea biofilms. The conversion of rcsA to a pseudogene during Y. pestis evolution, therefore, was a case of negative selection rather than neutral genetic drift. |
Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
Externí odkaz: |