title: Structure and evolution of teleost mitochondrial control regions.
abstract: We amplified and sequenced the mitochondrial control region from 23 species representing six families of teleost fish. The length of this segment is highly variable among even closely related species due to the presence of tandemly repeated sequences and large insertions. The position of the repetitive sequences suggests that they arise during replication both near the origin of replication and at the site of termination of the D-loop strand. Many of the conserved sequence blocks (CSBs) observed in mammals are also found among fish. In particular, the mammalian CSB-D is present in all of the fish species studied. Study of potential secondary structures of RNAs from the conserved regions provides little insight into the functional constraints on these regions. The variable structure of these control regions suggests that particular care should be taken to identify the most appropriate segment for studies of intraspecific variation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Zoology, University of New Hampshire, Durham 03824, USA.
authors.forename: W J
authors.initials: WJ
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Conroy
authors.forename: W H
authors.initials: WH
authors.lastname: Howell
authors.forename: T D
authors.initials: TD
authors.lastname: Kocher
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001483:Base Sequence; D005075:Biological Evolution; D002151:Calorimetry; D003001:Cloning, Molecular; D017124:Conserved Sequence; D003573:Cytochrome b Group / Q000235:genetics; D017931:DNA Primers; D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics*; D005399:Fishes / Q000235:genetics*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D009690:Nucleic Acid Conformation; D010802:Phylogeny; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction; D012361:RNA, Transfer, Pro / Q000235:genetics; D012091:Repetitive Sequences, Nucleic Acid; D012689:Sequence Homology, Nucleic Acid; D013045:Species Specificity
chemical_list: D003573:Cytochrome b Group; D017931:DNA Primers; D004272:DNA, Mitochondrial; D012361:RNA, Transfer, Pro