Phylogenetic analysis reveals stowaway-like elements may represent a fourth family of the IS630-Tc1-mariner superfamily.
The genomes of plants, like virtually all other eukaryotic organisms, harbor a diverse array of mobile elements, or transposons. In terms of numbers, the predominant type of transposons in many plants is the miniature inverted-repeat transposable element (MITE). There are three archetypal MITEs, known as Tourist, Stowaway, and Emigrant, each of which can be defined by a specific terminal inverted-repeat (TIR) sequence signature. Although their presence was known for over a decade, only recently have open reading frames (ORFs) been identified that correspond to putative transposases for each of the archetypes. We have identified two Stowaway elements that encode a putative transposase and are similar to members of the previously characterized IS630-Tc1-mariner superfamily. In this report, we provide a high-resolution phylogenetic analysis of the evolutionary relationship between Stowaway, Emigrant, and members of the IS630-Tc1-mariner superfamily. We show that although Emigrant is closely related to the pogo-like family of elements, Stowaway may represent a novel family. Integration of our results with previously published data leads to the conclusion that the three main types of MITEs have different evolutionary histories despite similarity in structure.
Turcotte
Kime
K
Department of Biology, McGill University, Montreal, Canada.
Bureau
Thomas
T
D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements / Q000235:genetics; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D006801:Humans; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D010944:Plants / Q000235:genetics; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D019895:Transposases / Q000235:genetics
D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D019895:Transposases