CIBIO, Centro de Investigação em Biodiversidade e Recursos Genéticos, Universidade do Porto, Campus Agrário de Vairão, Vairão, Portugal.
Mol Biol Evol. 2010 Nov;27(11):2437-40. doi: 10.1093/molbev/msq139. Epub 2010 Jun 4.
The human Y chromosome consists of ampliconic genes, which are located in palindromes and undergo frequent gene conversion, and single-copy genes including the primary sex-determining locus, SRY. Here, we demonstrate that SRY is duplicated in a large palindrome in the European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus). Furthermore, we show through comparative sequencing that orthologous palindrome arms have diverged 0.40% between rabbit subspecies over at least 2 My, but paralogous palindrome arms have remained nearly identical. This provides clear evidence of gene conversion on the rabbit Y chromosome. Together with previous observations in humans, these results suggest that gene conversion is a general feature of the evolution of the mammalian Y chromosome.
人类 Y 染色体由扩增基因组成,这些基因位于回文序列中,并经常发生基因转换,还包括单拷贝基因,如主要性别决定基因 SRY。在这里,我们证明了 SRY 在欧洲兔(Oryctolagus cuniculus)的一个大回文序列中发生了复制。此外,我们通过比较测序表明,在至少 200 万年的时间里,兔亚种之间的同源回文臂已经分化了 0.40%,而 paralogous 回文臂则几乎保持一致。这为兔 Y 染色体上的基因转换提供了明确的证据。结合人类的先前观察结果,这些结果表明基因转换是哺乳动物 Y 染色体进化的一个普遍特征。