Two types of cis-trans compensation in the evolution of transcriptional regulation.

ABSTRACT: Because distant species often share similar macromolecules, regulatory mutations are often considered responsible for much of their biological differences. Recently, a large portion of regulatory changes has been attributed to cis-regulatory mutations. Here, we examined an alternative possibility that the putative contribution of cis-regulatory changes was, in fact, caused by compensatory action of cis- and trans-regulatory elements. First, we show by stochastic simulations that compensatory cis-trans evolution maintains the binding affinity of a transcription factor at a constant level, thereby spuriously exaggerating the contribution of cis-regulatory mutations to gene expression divergence. This exaggeration was not observed when changes in the binding affinity were compensated by varia

SUBMITTER: Takahasi KR 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3174679 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature