Real-time observation of in situ transposition reveals transposon biology
TEs are core contributors to genetic diversity and novelty, which serve as primary driving forces for speciation, adaptive evolution, and even the emergence of biodiversity on Earth. In order to understand how TEs have impacted genetic variation and species diversification, the first step is to build an understanding of TEs themselves, referred to as TE biology. Here, we by combining methylation-free A. thaliana with Pacific Biosciences highly accurate long-read sequencing (PacBio HiFi-seq), we identified 39 mobilizable TEs and 104,325 in situ mobilization events in real time, providing an unprecedented opportunity to investigate TE biology. We systematically analyzed these TEs and their mobilization events, leading to multiple findings across several aspects of TE biology, including mobilizability, mechanisms of mobilization, footprints of DNA transposon excision, integration site selection, and sequence changes in both TEs and the host genome during mobilization. Taken together, our findings provide multi-level mechanistic insights into TE mobilization and substantially advance our understanding of TE biology.
TEs are core contributors to genetic diversity and novelty, which serve as primary driving forces for speciation, adaptive evolution, and even the emergence of biodiversity on Earth. In order to understand how TEs have impacted genetic variation and species diversification, the first step is to build an understanding of TEs themselves, referred to as TE biology. Here, we by combining methylation-free A. thaliana with Pacific Biosciences highly accurate long-read sequencing (PacBio HiFi-seq), we identified 39 mobilizable TEs and 104,325 in situ mobilization events in real time, providing an unprecedented opportunity to investigate TE biology. We systematically analyzed these TEs and their mobilization events, leading to multiple findings across several aspects of TE biology, including mobilizability, mechanisms of mobilization, footprints of DNA transposon excision, integration site selection, and sequence changes in both TEs and the host genome during mobilization. Taken together, our findings provide multi-level mechanistic insights into TE mobilization and substantially advance our understanding of TE biology.
Max Planck Institute for Biology Tuebingen