Decoding cilia function: defining specialized genes required for compartmentalized cilia biogenesis.
The evolution of the ancestral eukaryotic flagellum is an example of a cellular organelle that became dispensable in some modern eukaryotes while remaining an essential motile and sensory apparatus in others. To help define the repertoire of specialized proteins needed for the formation and function of cilia, we used comparative genomics to analyze the genomes of organisms with prototypical cilia, modified cilia, or no cilia and identified approximately 200 genes that are absent in the genomes of nonciliated eukaryotes but are conserved in ciliated organisms. Importantly, over 80% of the known ancestral proteins involved in cilia function are included in this small collection. Using Drosophila as a model system, we then characterized a novel family of proteins (OSEGs: outer segment) essential for ciliogenesis. We show that osegs encode components of a specialized transport pathway unique to the cilia compartment and are related to prototypical intracellular transport proteins.
Avidor-Reiss
Tomer
T
Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Division of Biological Sciences and Department of Neurosciences, University of California at San Diego, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA.
Maer
Andreia M
AM
Koundakjian
Edmund
E
Polyanovsky
Andrey
A
Keil
Thomas
T
Subramaniam
Shankar
S
Zuker
Charles S
CS
D000818:Animals; D002352:Carrier Proteins / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification; D002451:Cell Compartmentation / Q000235:genetics*; D002454:Cell Differentiation / Q000235:genetics*; D002923:Cilia / Q000235:genetics* / Q000648:ultrastructure; D004331:Drosophila melanogaster / Q000235:genetics; D005057:Eukaryotic Cells / Q000166:cytology / Q000502:physiology*; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D018507:Gene Expression Regulation, Developmental / Q000235:genetics*; D016678:Genome; D006801:Humans; D008854:Microscopy, Electron; D009475:Neurons, Afferent / Q000166:cytology / Q000378:metabolism; D020411:Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis; D010802:Phylogeny
D002352:Carrier Proteins