Vertebrate beta-thymosins: conserved synteny reveals the relationship between those of bony fish and of land vertebrates.

Using conservation of synteny I show how the four thymosins expressed by teleost fish are related to the three of tetrapods, which is not evident from their protein sequences. This clarification was aided by identification of a novel thymosin of reptilians that replaces the beta10 thymosin of mammals. Recent reconstruction of the ancestral vertebrate genome suggests that divergence of beta-thymosins began with duplication preceding the two rounds of whole genome duplication.