Enhancer sequence conservation between vertebrates is favoured in developmental regulator genes.
Sequence conservation has been used to find genes and to pinpoint functional non-coding sequences such as transcriptional regulatory elements. In this article, we analysed the conservation of 104 experimentally validated murine enhancer sequences between the mouse and zebrafish genomes. Surprisingly, only 10.5% of the mouse enhancers have homologues in zebrafish. All of the genes with conserved cis-elements have regulatory functions during embryonic development, perhaps reflecting substantial structural constraints on the integration of spatio-temporal signalling cues during the formation of the vertebrate body.
Plessy
Charles
C
IGBMC, 1 rue Laurent Fries, BP 10142 67404 Illkirch Cedex, France.
Dickmeis
Thomas
T
Chalmel
Frédéric
F
Strähle
Uwe
U
D000818:Animals; D030561:Databases, Nucleic Acid; D004742:Enhancer Elements, Genetic; D005809:Genes, Regulator / Q000235:genetics*; D006801:Humans; D051379:Mice; D015027:Zebrafish / Q000235:genetics*