title: Differential pre-mRNA Splicing Alters the Transcript Diversity of Helitrons Between the Maize Inbred Lines.
abstract: The propensity to capture and mobilize gene fragments by the highly abundant Helitron family of transposable elements likely impacts the evolution of genes in Zea mays. These elements provide a substrate for natural selection by giving birth to chimeric transcripts by intertwining exons of disparate genes. They also capture flanking exons by read-through transcription. Here, we describe the expression of selected Helitrons in different maize inbred lines. We recently reported that these Helitrons produce multiple isoforms of transcripts in inbred B73 via alternative splicing. Despite sharing high degrees of sequence similarity, the splicing profile of Helitrons differed among various maize inbred lines. The comparison of Helitron sequences identified unique polymorphisms in inbred B73, which potentially give rise to the alternatively spliced sites utilized by transcript isoforms. Some alterations in splicing, however, do not have obvious explanations. These observations not only add another level to the creation of transcript diversity by Helitrons among inbred lines but also provide novel insights into the cis-acting elements governing splice-site selection during pre-mRNA processing.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Oakland University, Rochester, Minnesota 48309-4401.
authors.forename: Brian T
authors.initials: BT
authors.lastname: Lynch
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Oakland University, Rochester, Minnesota 48309-4401.
authors.forename: Tara L
authors.initials: TL
authors.lastname: Patrick
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Oakland University, Rochester, Minnesota 48309-4401.
authors.forename: Jennifer J
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Moreno
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Oakland University, Rochester, Minnesota 48309-4401.
authors.forename: Amy E
authors.initials: AE
authors.lastname: Siebert
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Oakland University, Rochester, Minnesota 48309-4401.
authors.forename: Katarina M
authors.initials: KM
authors.lastname: Klusman
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Oakland University, Rochester, Minnesota 48309-4401.
authors.forename: Donya N
authors.initials: DN
authors.lastname: Shodja
authors.affiliation: Department of Horticultural Sciences and Program in Plant Molecular and Cellular Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida 32611.
authors.forename: L Curtis
authors.initials: LC
authors.lastname: Hannah
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Sciences, Oakland University, Rochester, Minnesota 48309-4401 lal@oakland.edu.
authors.forename: Shailesh K
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Lal
mesh_terms: D017398:Alternative Splicing; D001483:Base Sequence; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements / Q000235:genetics*; D018745:Genome, Plant; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D018517:Plant Roots / Q000378:metabolism; D018520:Plant Shoots / Q000378:metabolism; D012322:RNA Precursors / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D003313:Zea mays / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D012322:RNA Precursors
keywords: Helitron; alternative splicing; gene evolution; transposable element