title: Transcriptional reprogramming and backup between duplicate genes: is it a genomewide phenomenon?
abstract: Deleting a duplicate gene often results in a less severe phenotype than deleting a singleton gene, a phenomenon commonly attributed to functional compensation among duplicates. However, duplicate genes rapidly diverge in expression patterns after duplication, making functional compensation less probable for ancient duplicates. Case studies suggested that a gene may provide compensation by altering its expression upon removal of its duplicate copy. On the basis of this observation and a genomic analysis, it was recently proposed that transcriptional reprogramming and backup among duplicates is a genomewide phenomenon in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Here we reanalyze the yeast data and show that the high dispensability of duplicate genes with low expression similarity is a consequence of expression similarity and gene dispensability, each being correlated with a third factor, the number of protein interactions per gene. There is little evidence supporting widespread functional compensation of divergently expressed duplicate genes by transcriptional reprogramming.
authors.affiliation: Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA.
authors.forename: Xionglei
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: He
authors.forename: Jianzhi
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D020131:Genes, Duplicate / Q000502:physiology*; D016681:Genome, Fungal; D012441:Saccharomyces cerevisiae / Q000235:genetics; D014158:Transcription, Genetic / Q000502:physiology*