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evolutionary genomics
Wednesday 26 January 2005
genome sequences have become available from an increasing range of yeast species, which has led to notable advances in our understanding of evolutionary mechanisms in eukaryotes.
Yeasts offer us a unique opportunity to examine how molecular and reproductive mechanisms combine to affect genome architectures and drive evolutionary changes over a broad range of species.
Several molecular mechanisms - such as gene duplication, mutation and acquisition of novel genetic material - that underlie yeast evolutionary genomics. Some results from yeasts can be extended to other eukaryotes.
Bacterias (20517341)
Host-adapted bacteria include mutualists and pathogens of animals, plants and insects. Their study is therefore important for biotechnology, biodiversity and human health.
The recent rapid expansion in bacterial genome data has provided insights into the adaptive, diversifying and reductive evolutionary processes that occur during host adaptation. The results have challenged many pre-existing concepts built from studies of laboratory bacterial strains.
Furthermore, recent studies have revealed genetic changes associated with transitions from parasitism to mutualism and opened new research avenues to understand the functional reshaping of bacteria as they adapt to growth in the cytoplasm of a eukaryotic host.
Links
The evolutionary ecology of the genome, down the cellar, August 20, 2010,
References
Yeast evolutionary genomics. Dujon B. Nat Rev Genet. 2010 Jul;11(7):512-24. PMID: 20559329
Evolutionary microbial genomics: insights into bacterial host adaptation.
Toft C, Andersson SG. Nat Rev Genet. 2010 Jun 2;11(7):465-475. PMID: 20517341
Constraints and plasticity in genome and molecular-phenome evolution. Koonin EV, Wolf YI. Nat Rev Genet. 2010 Jun 15;11(7):487-498. PMID: 20548290
Molecular evolutionary genomics of birds. Ellegren H. Cytogenet Genome Res. 2007;117(1-4):120-30. PMID: 17675852
Cañestro C, Yokoi H, Postlethwait JH. Evolutionary developmental biology and genomics. Nat Rev Genet. 2007 Dec;8(12):932-42. PMID: 18007650
Presgraves DC. Evolutionary genomics: new genes for new jobs. Curr Biol. 2005 Jan 26;15(2):R52-3. PMID: 15668155
