Bats with hATs: evidence for recent DNA transposon activity in genus Myotis.

Transposable elements make up a significant fraction of many eukaryotic genomes. Although both classes of transposable elements, the DNA transposons and the retrotransposons, show substantial expansion in plants and invertebrates, the DNA transposons are thought to have become inactive in mammalian genomes long ago. Here, we report the first evidence for recent activity of DNA transposons in a mammalian lineage, the bat genus Myotis. Six recently active families of nonautonomous hobo/Activator/TAM transposons were identified in the Myotis lucifugus genome using computational tools. Low sequence divergence among the individual sequences and between individual sequences and their respective consensus sequences suggest their recent expansion in the M. lucifugus genome. Furthermore, amplification and sequencing of polymorphic insertion loci in a related taxon, M. austroriparius, confirms their recent activity. Myotis is one of the largest mammalian genera with 103 species. The discovery of DNA transposon activity in this genus may therefore influence our understanding of genome evolution and diversification in bats and in mammals in general. Furthermore, the identification of a likely autonomous element may lead to new approaches for mammalian genetic manipulation.

[1]  E. Eichler,et al.  A genome-wide comparison of recent chimpanzee and human segmental duplications , 2005, Nature.

[2]  Min Han,et al.  Efficient Transposition of the piggyBac (PB) Transposon in Mammalian Cells and Mice , 2005, Cell.

[3]  T. Bestor.  Transposons Reanimated in Mice , 2005, Cell.

[4]  D. Largaespada,et al.  Mammalian mutagenesis using a highly mobile somatic Sleeping Beauty transposon system , 2005, Nature.

[5]  J. Jurka,et al.  Repbase Update, a database of eukaryotic repetitive elements , 2005, Cytogenetic and Genome Research.

[6]  P. Capy,et al.  Abundance, distribution and dynamics of retrotransposable elements and transposons: similarities and differences , 2005, Cytogenetic and Genome Research.

[7]  M. Batzer,et al.  Retrotransposition of Alu elements: how many sources? , 2004, Trends in genetics : TIG.

[8]  E. Eichler,et al.  Recent segmental duplications in the working draft assembly of the brown Norway rat. , 2004, Genome research.

[9]  Junjun Zhang,et al.  Recent segmental and gene duplications in the mouse genome , 2003, Genome Biology.

[10]  D. Largaespada,et al.  Gene transfer into genomes of human cells by the sleeping beauty transposon system. , 2003, Molecular therapy : the journal of the American Society of Gene Therapy.

[11]  R. Bussche,et al.  Molecular Phylogenetics of the Chiropteran Family Vespertilionidae , 2003 .

[12]  A. Iida,et al.  The medaka fish Tol2 transposable element can undergo excision in human and mouse cells , 2003, Journal of Human Genetics.

[13]  Colin N. Dewey,et al.  Initial sequencing and comparative analysis of the mouse genome. , 2002 .

[14]  M. Hasegawa,et al.  Intra- and Interfamily Relationships of Vespertilionidae Inferred by Various Molecular Markers Including SINE Insertion Data , 2002, Journal of Molecular Evolution.

[15]  Sudhir Kumar,et al.  Mutation rates in mammalian genomes , 2002, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[16]  M. Ruedi,et al.  Molecular systematics of bats of the genus Myotis (Vespertilionidae) suggests deterministic ecomorphological convergences. , 2001, Molecular phylogenetics and evolution.

[17]  M. Nishida,et al.  Phylogenetic relationships and ancient incomplete lineage sorting among cichlid fishes in Lake Tanganyika as revealed by analysis of the insertion of retroposons. , 2001, Molecular biology and evolution.

[18]  G. Lithwick,et al.  Structure and evolution of the hAT transposon superfamily. , 2001, Genetics.

[19]  F. Kempken,et al.  The hAT family: a versatile transposon group common to plants, fungi, animals, and man , 2001, Chromosoma.

[20]  J. V. Moran,et al.  Initial sequencing and analysis of the human genome. , 2001, Nature.

[21]  M. G. Kidwell,et al.  PERSPECTIVE: TRANSPOSABLE ELEMENTS, PARASITIC DNA, AND GENOME EVOLUTION , 2001, Evolution; international journal of organic evolution.

[22]  Phillip SanMiguel,et al.  Evidence that a Recent Increase in Maize Genome Size was Caused by the Massive Amplification of Intergene Retrotransposons , 1998 .

[23]  N. Okada,et al.  Detection of the ongoing sorting of ancestrally polymorphic SINEs toward fixation or loss in populations of two species of charr during speciation. , 1998, Genetics.

[24]  M. G. Kidwell,et al.  Transposable elements as sources of variation in animals and plants. , 1997, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[25]  M. G. Kidwell,et al.  Horizontal transfer , 1992, Current Biology.

[26]  J. S. Findley.  Phenetic relationships among bats of the genus Myotis , 1972 .

[27]  Eugene W. Myers,et al.  PILER: identification and classification of genomic repeats , 2005, ISMB.

[28]  J. Bennetzen,et al.  Transposable element contributions to plant gene and genome evolution , 2004, Plant Molecular Biology.

[29]  S Rozen,et al.  Primer3 on the WWW for general users and for biologist programmers. , 2000, Methods in molecular biology.

[30]  D. Russell,et al.  Mammalian paleofaunas of the world , 1983 .

[31]  R. Nowak,et al.  Walker's mammals of the world , 1968 .