Department of Biology, University of Turku, Turku 20500, Finland.
Bioeconomy Research Team, Novia University of Applied Sciences, Raseborgsvägen 9, FI-10600 Raseborg, Finland; Evolutionary Ecology Unit, Department of Biology, Lund University, Sölvegatan 39 (Ecology Building), SE-223 62 Lund, Sweden.
Mol Phylogenet Evol. 2023 Apr;181:107722. doi: 10.1016/j.ympev.2023.107722. Epub 2023 Jan 30.
Mito-nuclear insertions, or NUMTs, relate to genetic material of mitochondrial origin that have been transferred to the nuclear DNA molecule. The increasing amounts of genomic data currently being produced presents an opportunity to investigate this type of patterns in genome evolution of non-model organisms. Identifying NUMTs across a range of closely related taxa allows one to generalize patterns of insertion and maintenance in autosomes, which is ultimately relevant to the understanding of genome biology and evolution. Here we collected existing pairwise genome-mitogenome data of the order Strigiformes, a group that includes all the nocturnal bird predators. We identified NUMTs by applying percent similarity thresholds after blasting mitochondrial genomes against nuclear genome assemblies. We identified NUMTsin all genomes with numbers ranging from 4 in Bubo bubo to 24 in Ciccaba nigrolineata. Statistical analyses revealed NUMT size to negatively correlate with NUMT's sequence similarity to with original mtDNA region. Lastly, characterizing these nuclear insertions of mitochondrial origin in a comparative genomics framework produced variable phylogenetic patterns, suggesting in some cases that insertions might pre-date speciation events within Strigiformes.
线粒体-核插入物（NUMTs）与线粒体来源的遗传物质有关，这些物质已转移到核 DNA 分子中。目前正在产生的越来越多的基因组数据为研究非模式生物基因组进化中的这种模式提供了机会。在一系列密切相关的分类群中识别 NUMTs 可以概括插入和维持在常染色体中的模式，这最终与理解基因组生物学和进化有关。在这里，我们收集了 Strigiformes 目（包括所有夜间鸟类捕食者）的现有成对基因组-线粒体基因组数据。我们通过将线粒体基因组与核基因组组装进行比对来应用百分比相似性阈值来识别 NUMTs。我们在所有基因组中都鉴定到了 NUMTs，数量从 Bubo bubo 的 4 个到 Ciccaba nigrolineata 的 24 个不等。统计分析表明，NUMT 的大小与 NUMT 与原始 mtDNA 区域的序列相似性呈负相关。最后，在比较基因组学框架中对这些线粒体起源的核插入进行特征描述产生了可变的系统发育模式，表明在某些情况下，插入可能早于 Strigiformes 内部的物种形成事件。
