title: A genome sequence survey of the filarial nematode Brugia malayi: repeats, gene discovery, and comparative genomics.
abstract: Comparative nematode genomics has thus far been largely constrained to the genus Caenorhabditis, but a huge diversity of other nematode species, and genomes, exist. The Brugia malayi genome is approximately 100 Mb in size, and distributed across five chromosome pairs. Previous genomic investigations have included definition of major repeat classes and sequencing of selected genes. We have generated over 18,000 sequences from the ends of large-insert clones from bacterial artificial chromosome libraries. These end sequences, totalling over 10 Mb of sequence, contain just under 8 Mb of unique sequence. We identified the known Mbo I and Hha I repeat families in the sequence data, and also identified several new repeats based on their abundance. Genomic copies of 17% of B. malayi genes defined by expressed sequence tags have been identified. Nearly one quarter of end sequences can encode peptides with significant similarity to protein sequences in the public databases, and we estimate that we have identified more than 2700 new B. malayi genes. Importantly, 459 end sequences had homologues in other organisms, but lacked a match in the completely sequenced genomes of Caenorhabditis briggsae and Caenorhabditis elegans, emphasising the role of gene loss in genome evolution. B. malayi is estimated to have over 18,500 protein-coding genes.
authors.affiliation: Ashworth Laboratories, Institution of Cell, Animal and Polulation Biology, School of Biological Sciences, University of Edinburgh, King's Buildings, Edinburgh EH9 3JT, UK.
authors.forename: Claire
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Whitton
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Daub
authors.forename: Mike
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Quail
authors.forename: Neil
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Hall
authors.forename: Jeremy
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Foster
authors.forename: Jennifer
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ware
authors.forename: Mehul
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ganatra
authors.forename: Barton
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Slatko
authors.forename: Bart
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Barrell
authors.forename: Mark
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Blaxter
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D017178:Brugia malayi / Q000235:genetics*; D002107:Caenorhabditis / Q000235:genetics; D017173:Caenorhabditis elegans / Q000235:genetics; D002874:Chromosome Mapping; D022202:Chromosomes, Artificial, Bacterial / Q000235:genetics; D018509:DNA, Helminth / Q000235:genetics; D005785:Gene Conversion; D017238:Genes, Helminth; D016678:Genome; D023281:Genomics; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D018510:RNA, Helminth / Q000235:genetics; D012335:RNA, Ribosomal / Q000235:genetics; D012091:Repetitive Sequences, Nucleic Acid; D018626:Retroelements / Q000235:genetics; D013045:Species Specificity
chemical_list: D018509:DNA, Helminth; D018510:RNA, Helminth; D012335:RNA, Ribosomal; D018626:Retroelements