Project description:Genes with sex-biased expression often show rapid molecular evolution between species. Previous population genetic and comparative genomic studies of Drosophila melanogaster and D. simulans revealed that male-biased genes have especially high rates of adaptive evolution. To test if this is also the case for other lineages within the melanogaster group, we investigated gene expression in D. ananassae, a species that occurs in structured populations in tropical and subtropical regions. We used custom-made microarrays and published microarray data to characterize the sex-biased expression of 129 D. ananassae genes whose D. melanogaster orthologs had been classified previously as male-biased, female-biased, or unbiased in their expression and had been studied extensively at the population-genetic level.
Project description:Extensive sex-biased expression has been seen in multiple surveys D. melanogaster. We were interested in broadly sampling sex-biased expression of orthologs and species- or lineage-specific genes in the Drosophila genus. To appropriately assay gene expression in multiple species, we used custom microarrays designed against each of six species that broadly sample the phylogenetic space represented by the newly completed genomes (D. simulans, D. yakuba, D. ananassae, D. pseudoobscura, D. virilis and D. mojavensis) and an array designed against D. melanogaster to determine the overall patterns of sex-biased expression in those species and their chromosome linkage. Keywords: other
Project description:We sequenced mRNA from whole flies of females and male of Drosophila melanogaster, D. simulans, D. yakuba, D. ananassae, D. pseudobscura, D. mojavensis, and D. virilis as part of the modENCODE project to validate novel gene models found in D. melanogaster, identify genes differentially expressed between the sexes and sex-specific alternative splicing events, and examine the evolution of gene expression.
