Lane David P, Verma Chandra
p53Lab (ASTAR), Singapore.
Genes Cancer. 2012 Mar;3(3-4):320-4. doi: 10.1177/1947601912458285.
While the presence, in the invertebrates, of genes related in sequence and function to the vertebrate p53 family has been known since the discovery of the fly Drosophila melanogaster Dmp53 and the worm Caenorhabditis elegans cep-1 gene, the failure to discover homologs of the essential vertebrate negative regulator of p53 Mdm2 in these species led to the false assumption that Mdm2 was only present in vertebrates. Very recently, clear homologs of Mdm2 have been discovered in a wide range of invertebrate species, raising a series of interesting questions about the evolution of the p53 pathway. Here, a personal account of the discovery of Mdm2-like genes in the Placozoa and Arthropoda is used to speculate on aspects of the evolution, structure, and function of the p53 pathway.
自果蝇Drosophila melanogaster的Dmp53基因和线虫Caenorhabditis elegans的cep-1基因被发现以来,人们就知道无脊椎动物中存在与脊椎动物p53家族在序列和功能上相关的基因。然而,在这些物种中未能发现脊椎动物中至关重要的p53负调控因子Mdm2的同源物,这导致了一个错误的假设,即Mdm2仅存在于脊椎动物中。最近,在多种无脊椎动物物种中发现了清晰的Mdm2同源物,这引发了一系列关于p53通路进化的有趣问题。在此,通过个人对扁盘动物门和节肢动物门中类Mdm2基因发现过程的描述,来推测p53通路进化、结构和功能的相关方面。