Something Old, Something New: Conserved Enzymes and the Evolution of Novelty in Plant Specialized Metabolism.
Plants produce hundreds of thousands of small molecules known as specialized metabolites, many of which are of economic and ecological importance. This remarkable variety is a consequence of the diversity and rapid evolution of specialized metabolic pathways. These novel biosynthetic pathways originate via gene duplication or by functional divergence of existing genes, and they subsequently evolve through selection and/or drift. Studies over the past two decades revealed that diverse specialized metabolic pathways have resulted from the incorporation of primary metabolic enzymes. We discuss examples of enzyme recruitment from primary metabolism and the variety of paths taken by duplicated primary metabolic enzymes toward integration into specialized metabolism. These examples provide insight into processes by which plant specialized metabolic pathways evolve and suggest approaches to discover enzymes of previously uncharacterized metabolic networks.
Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (G.D.M., R.L.L.) and Department of Plant Biology (R.L.L.), Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan 48824.
Gaurav D
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8761-064X
GD
Moghe
Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (G.D.M., R.L.L.) and Department of Plant Biology (R.L.L.), Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan 48824 lastr@msu.edu.
Robert L
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6974-9587
RL
Last
D005075:Biological Evolution; D004798:Enzymes / Q000096:biosynthesis*; D018506:Gene Expression Regulation, Plant / Q000502:physiology*; D053858:Metabolic Networks and Pathways / Q000502:physiology; D010944:Plants / Q000201:enzymology* / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D013045:Species Specificity
D004798:Enzymes