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PubMed · 16884525

Primate-specific evolution of an LDLR enhancer.

Qian-fei Wang·Shyam Prabhakar·Qianben Wang·Alan M Moses·Sumita Chanan·Myles Brown·Michael B Eisen·Jan-Fang Cheng·Edward M Rubin·Dario Boffelli
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Abstract

BACKGROUND: Sequence changes in regulatory regions have often been invoked to explain phenotypic divergence among species, but molecular examples of this have been difficult to obtain. RESULTS: In this study we identified an anthropoid primate-specific sequence element that contributed to the regulatory evolution of the low-density lipoprotein receptor. Using a combination of close and distant species genomic sequence comparisons coupled with in vivo and in vitro studies, we found that a functional cholesterol-sensing sequence motif arose and was fixed within a pre-existing enhancer in the common ancestor of anthropoid primates. CONCLUSION: Our study demonstrates one molecular mechanism by which ancestral mammalian regulatory elements can evolve to perform new functions in the primate lineage leading to human.

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Amino Acid MotifsAnimalsBase SequenceCell LineChromatin ImmunoprecipitationComputational BiologyConserved SequenceDNA PrimersEnhancer Elements, GeneticEvolution, MolecularHumansMiceMolecular Sequence DataPhylogenyPrimatesReceptors, LDLSequence AlignmentComparative StudyJournal ArticleResearch Support, N.I.H., ExtramuralResearch Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

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Qian-fei Wang, Shyam Prabhakar, Qianben Wang, Alan M Moses, Sumita Chanan, Myles Brown, Michael B Eisen, Jan-Fang Cheng, Edward M Rubin, Dario Boffelli. 2006-08-02. Primate-specific evolution of an LDLR enhancer.. https://doi.org/10.1186/gb-2006-7-8-r68

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