Yan Stephanie M, McCoy Rajiv C
Department of Biology, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, 21218, USA.
Department of Biology, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, 21218, USA.
Curr Opin Genet Dev. 2020 Jun;62:44-49. doi: 10.1016/j.gde.2020.05.014. Epub 2020 Jun 29.
Differences in gene expression are thought to account for most phenotypic differences within and between species. Consequently, gene expression is a powerful lens through which to study divergence between modern humans and our closest evolutionary relatives, the Neanderthals and Denisovans. Such insights complement biological knowledge gleaned from the fossil record, while also revealing general features of the mode and tempo of regulatory evolution. Because of the degradation of ancient RNA, gene expression profiles of archaic hominins must be studied by indirect means. As such, conclusions drawn from these studies are often laden with assumptions about the genetic architecture of gene expression, the complexity of which is increasingly apparent. Despite these challenges, rapid technical and conceptual advances in the fields of ancient genomics, functional genomics, statistical genomics, and genome engineering are revolutionizing understanding of hominin gene expression evolution.
基因表达的差异被认为是物种内部和物种之间大多数表型差异的原因。因此，基因表达是一个强大的视角，通过它可以研究现代人类与我们最亲近的进化亲属尼安德特人和丹尼索瓦人之间的差异。这些见解补充了从化石记录中收集到的生物学知识，同时也揭示了调控进化的模式和节奏的一般特征。由于古代RNA的降解，必须通过间接手段研究古人类的基因表达谱。因此，从这些研究中得出的结论往往充满了关于基因表达遗传结构的假设，而其复杂性日益明显。尽管存在这些挑战，但古代基因组学、功能基因组学、统计基因组学和基因组工程领域的快速技术和概念进步正在彻底改变对人类基因表达进化的理解。
