Phylogenetic and evolutionary relationships and developmental expression patterns of the zebrafish twist gene family

Gare Hoon Yeo, Felicia S.H. Cheah, Christoph Winkler, Ethylin Wang Jabs, Byrappa Venkatesh, Samuel S. Chong

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

14 Scopus citations

Abstract

Four members of the twist gene family (twist1a, 1b, 2, and 3) are found in the zebrafish, and they are thought to have arisen through three rounds of gene duplication, two of which occurred prior to the tetrapod-fish split. Phylogenetic analysis groups most of the vertebrate Twist1 peptides into clade I, except for the Twist1b proteins of the acanthopterygian fish (medaka, pufferfish, stickleback), which clustered within clade III. Paralogies and orthologies among the zebrafish, medaka, and human twist genes were determined using comparative synteny analysis of the chromosomal regions flanking these genes. Comparative nucleotide substitution analyses also revealed a faster rate of nucleotide mutation/substitution in the acanthopterygian twist1b compared to the zebrafish twist1b, thus accounting for their anomalous phylogenetic clustering. We also observed minimal expression overlap among the four twist genes, suggesting that despite their significant peptide similarity, their regulatory controls have diverged considerably, with minimal functional redundancy between them.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)289-300
Number of pages12
JournalDevelopment Genes and Evolution
Volume219
Issue number6
DOIs
StatePublished - Jun 2009

Keywords

  • Expression
  • Medaka
  • Orthology
  • Phylogeny
  • Regulation
  • Synteny
  • Twist
  • Zebrafish

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