Cited by 445Chromosomal and Genetic VariationsGenomics and Phylogenetic StudiesRNA Research and Splicing

Remarkable Interkingdom Conservation of Intron Positions and Massive, Lineage-Specific Intron Loss and Gain in Eukaryotic Evolution

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Rogozin, Igor B., Wolf, Yuri I., Sorokin, Alexander V., Mirkin, Boris G., Koonin, Eugene V.·2003·Current Biology

Abstract

Sequencing of eukaryotic genomes allows one to address major evolutionary problems, such as the evolution of gene structure. We compared the intron positions in 684 orthologous gene sets from 8 complete genomes of animals, plants, fungi, and protists and constructed parsimonious scenarios of evolution of the exon-intron structure for the respective genes. Approximately one-third of the introns in the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum are shared with at least one crown group eukaryote; this number indicates that these introns have been conserved through >1.5 billion years of evolution that separate Plasmodium from the crown group. Paradoxically, humans share many more introns with the plant Arabidopsis thaliana than with the fly or nematode. The inferred evolutionary scenario holds that the common ancestor of Plasmodium and the crown group and, especially, the common ancestor of animals, plants, and fungi had numerous introns. Most of these ancestral introns, which are retained in the genomes of vertebrates and plants, have been lost in fungi, nematodes, arthropods, and probably Plasmodium. In addition, numerous introns have been inserted into vertebrate and plant genes, whereas, in other lineages, intron gain was much less prominent.

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Crossref · 10.1016/s0960-9822(03)00558-x

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  • The clustering of scaffolds and chromosome segments defines 15 large PALs, each with descendants of more than one hundred ancestral eumetazoan genes.

    “This clustering of scaffolds and chromosome segments defines 15 large PALs, each with descendants of more than one hundred ancestral eumetazoan genes.”

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Authors
Rogozin, I. B., Wolf, Y. I., Sorokin, A. V., Mirkin, B. G., & Koonin, E. V.
Affiliations
  • National Institutes of Health (US)
  • Birkbeck, University of London (GB)
Corresponding author
Koonin, Eugene V.
Venue
Current Biology
Publisher
Elsevier BV
Published
2003-09
Volume
13
Issue
17
Pages
1512-1517
ISSN
0960-9822 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W1968733465
Cited by
445
References
28
Citations by year
2026: 7 · 2025: 19 · 2024: 11 · 2023: 15 · 2022: 25 · 2021: 22 · 2020: 10 · 2019: 13 · 2018: 9 · 2017: 16 · 2016: 14 · 2015: 18 · 2014: 15 · 2013: 17 · 2012: 14
FWCI
33.53
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Current Biology (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Plant Science › Chromosomal and Genetic Variations
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Genomics and Phylogenetic Studies
  • Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › RNA Research and Splicing
Keywords
intron positions, intron loss, intron gain, orthologs, Plasmodium falciparum, Arabidopsis thaliana, eukaryotic evolution
MeSH terms
Amino Acid Sequence, Animals, Fungi, Humans, Introns, Invertebrates, Molecular Sequence Data, Phylogeny, Plants, Conserved Sequence, Evolution, Molecular

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