Dataset Information

The Green Valley of Drosophila melanogaster Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.

ABSTRACT: Constitutive heterochromatin represents a significant fraction of eukaryotic genomes (10% in Arabidopsis, 20% in humans, 30% in D. melanogaster, and up to 85% in certain nematodes) and shares similar genetic and molecular properties in animal and plant species. Studies conducted over the last few years on D. melanogaster and other organisms led to the discovery of several functions associated with constitutive heterochromatin. This made it possible to revise the concept that this ubiquitous genomic territory is incompatible with gene expression. The aim of this review is to focus the attention on a group of protein-coding genes resident in D. melanogaster constitutive of heterochromatin, which are implicated in different steps of cell division.

SUBMITTER: Messina G

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9563267 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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The Green Valley of Drosophila melanogaster Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.

Messina Giovanni G Prozzillo Yuri Y Bizzochi Greta G Marsano Renè Massimiliano RM Dimitri Patrizio P

Cells 20220929 19

Constitutive heterochromatin represents a significant fraction of eukaryotic genomes (10% in Arabidopsis, 20% in humans, 30% in D. melanogaster, and up to 85% in certain nematodes) and shares similar genetic and molecular properties in animal and plant species. Studies conducted over the last few years on D. melanogaster and other organisms led to the discovery of several functions associated with constitutive heterochromatin. This made it possible to revise the concept that this u ...[more]

PMID: 36231024

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Project description:Constitutive heterochromatin is a ubiquitous and still unveiled component of eukaryotic genomes, within which it comprises large portions. Although constitutive heterochromatin is generally considered to be transcriptionally silent, it contains a significant variety of sequences that are expressed, among which about 300 single-copy coding genes have been identified by genetic and genomic analyses in the last decades. Here, we report the results of the evolutionary analysis of Yeti, an essential gene of Drosophila melanogaster located in the deep pericentromeric region of chromosome 2R. By FISH, we showed that Yeti maintains a heterochromatin location in both D. simulans and D. sechellia species, closely related to D. melanogaster, while in the more distant species e.g., D. pseudoobscura and D. virilis, it is found within euchromatin, in the syntenic chromosome Muller C, that corresponds to the 2R arm of D. melanogaster chromosome 2. Thus, over evolutionary time, Yeti has been resident on the same chromosomal element, but it progressively moved closer to the pericentric regions. Moreover, in silico reconstruction of the Yeti gene structure in 19 Drosophila species and in 5 non-drosophilid dipterans shows a rather stable organization during evolution. Accordingly, by PCR analysis and sequencing, we found that the single intron of Yeti does not undergo major intraspecies or interspecies size changes, unlike the introns of other essential Drosophila heterochromatin genes, such as light and Dbp80. This implicates diverse evolutionary forces in shaping the structural organization of genes found within heterochromatin. Finally, the results of dS - dN tests show that Yeti is under negative selection both in heterochromatin and euchromatin, and indicate that the change in genomic location did not affected significantly the molecular evolution of the gene. Together, the results of this work contribute to our understanding of the evolutionary dynamics of constitutive heterochromatin in the genomes of higher eukaryotes.

Dataset Information

The Green Valley of Drosophila melanogaster Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.

Publications

The Green Valley of <i>Drosophila melanogaster</i> Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.

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The Green Valley of Drosophila&nbsp;melanogaster Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.

Publications

The Green Valley of &lt;i&gt;Drosophila melanogaster&lt;/i&gt; Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets

The Green Valley of Drosophila melanogaster Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.

The Green Valley of <i>Drosophila melanogaster</i> Constitutive Heterochromatin: Protein-Coding Genes Involved in Cell Division Control.