title: Prediction of aquaporin function by integrating evolutionary and functional analyses.
abstract: Aquaporins (AQPs) are a family of channel proteins, which transport water and/or small solutes across cell membranes. AQPs are present in Bacteria, Eukarya, and Archaea. The classical AQP evolution paradigm explains the inconsistent phylogenetic trees by multiple transfer events and emphasizes that the assignment of orthologous AQPs is not possible, making it difficult to integrate functional information. Recently, a novel phylogenetic framework of eukaryotic AQP evolution showed congruence between eukaryotic AQPs and organismal trees identifying 32 orthologous clusters in plants and animals (Soto et al. Gene 503:165-176, 2012). In this article, we discuss in depth the methodological strength, the ability to predict functionality and the AQP community perception about the different paradigms of AQP evolution. Moreover, we show an updated review of AQPs transport functions in association with phylogenetic analyses. Finally, we discuss the possible effect of AQP data integration in the understanding of water and solute transport in eukaryotic cells.
authors.affiliation: Instituto de Investigaciones en Ingeniería Genética y Biología Molecular, Dr. Hector Torres (INGEBI-CONICET), Vuelta de Obligado 2490, C1428ADN, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
authors.forename: Juliana
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Perez Di Giorgio
authors.forename: Gabriela
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Soto
authors.forename: Karina
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Alleva
authors.forename: Cintia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Jozefkowicz
authors.forename: Gabriela
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Amodeo
authors.forename: Jorge Prometeo
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Muschietti
authors.forename: Nicolás Daniel
authors.initials: ND
authors.lastname: Ayub
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D020346:Aquaporins / Q000145:classification / Q000502:physiology*; D001419:Bacteria; D001692:Biological Transport; D056890:Eukaryota; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D006801:Humans; D005810:Multigene Family; D010802:Phylogeny; D010944:Plants; D011487:Protein Conformation; D054730:Protein Interaction Domains and Motifs
chemical_list: D020346:Aquaporins