Comparative RNAi screens in C. elegans and C. briggsae reveal the impact of developmental system drift on gene function.

ABSTRACT: Although two related species may have extremely similar phenotypes, the genetic networks underpinning this conserved biology may have diverged substantially since they last shared a common ancestor. This is termed Developmental System Drift (DSD) and reflects the plasticity of genetic networks. One consequence of DSD is that some orthologous genes will have evolved different in vivo functions in two such phenotypically similar, related species and will therefore have different loss of function phenotypes. Here we report an RNAi screen in C. elegans and C. briggsae to identify such cases. We screened 1333 genes in both species and identified 91 orthologues that have different RNAi phenotypes. Intriguingly, we find that recently evolved genes of unknown function have the fastest evolving in

SUBMITTER: Verster AJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3916228 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature