title: Conservation within artiodactyls of an AATA interrupt in the IGF-I microsatellite for 19-35 million years.
abstract: Occurrence of an AATA interrupt in the IGF-I microsatellite was investigated in a number of Artiodactyl species, namely pigs, camels, deer, cattle, goats, and sheep. Comparison of DNA sequences in the 5' flank of the microsatellite in these species revealed that the interrupt within the microsatellite is conserved in deer, cattle, sheep, and goats but is absent from camels and pigs. The interrupt was introduced into the Artiodactyl phylogeny after the divergence of the Camelidae but before the divergence of the Cervidae, and thus its time of origin can be estimated to be 19-35 MYA. In contrast to the repeat units which are hypermutable, the interrupt has been conserved for a very long time and may even have suppressed microsatellite variation by inhibiting replication slippage. A 12-bp deletion in the 5' flank of the microsatellite in camels corresponds to a consensus reversed repeat in deer, cattle, sheep, and goats with unknown functional significance. Apart from this deletion, the 5' flank of the microsatellite is highly conserved in Artiodactyl species.
authors.affiliation: Department of Animal Sciences, University of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. msharifli@pop.usyd.edu.au
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Reza Shariflou
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Moran
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001188:Artiodactyla / Q000235:genetics*; D001483:Base Sequence; D002417:Cattle; D017124:Conserved Sequence / Q000235:genetics*; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D006801:Humans; D007334:Insulin-Like Growth Factor I / Q000235:genetics*; D018895:Microsatellite Repeats / Q000235:genetics*; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D051381:Rats; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D007334:Insulin-Like Growth Factor I