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The Drosophila Myc gene, diminutive, is a positive regulator of the Sex-lethal establishment promoter, Sxl-Pe.

ABSTRACT: The binary switch gene Sex-lethal (Sxl) controls sexual identity in Drosophila. When activated, Sxl imposes female identity, whereas male identity ensues by default when the gene is off. The decision to activate Sxl is controlled by an X chromosome counting system that regulates the Sxl establishment promoter, Sxl-Pe. The counting system depends upon the twofold difference in the gene dose of a series of X-linked transcription factors or numerators. Because of this difference in dose, early female embryos express twice the amount of these transcription factors, and the cumulative action of these transcription factors turns on Sxl-Pe. Here we show that the Drosophila Myc gene diminutive is an X-linked numerator.

SUBMITTER: Kappes G

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3029748 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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The Drosophila Myc gene, diminutive, is a positive regulator of the Sex-lethal establishment promoter, Sxl-Pe.

Kappes Gretchen G Deshpande Girish G Mulvey Brett B BB Horabin Jamila I JI Schedl Paul P

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 20110110 4

The binary switch gene Sex-lethal (Sxl) controls sexual identity in Drosophila. When activated, Sxl imposes female identity, whereas male identity ensues by default when the gene is off. The decision to activate Sxl is controlled by an X chromosome counting system that regulates the Sxl establishment promoter, Sxl-Pe. The counting system depends upon the twofold difference in the gene dose of a series of X-linked transcription factors or numerators. Because of this difference in dose, early fema ...[more]

PMID: 21220321

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Project description:BACKGROUND: Sex determining mechanisms are evolutionarily labile and related species often use different primary signals and gene regulatory networks. This is well illustrated by the sex determining cascade of Drosophila fruitflies, which have recruited Sex-lethal as the master switch and cellular memory of sexual identity, a role performed in other insects by the gene transformer. Here we investigate the evolutionary change in the coding sequences of sex determining genes associated with the recruitment of Sex-lethal. We analyze sequences of Sex-lethal itself, its Drosophila paralogue sister-or-Sex-lethal and downstream targets transformer and doublesex. RESULTS: We find that the recruitment of sister-or-Sex-lethal was associated with a number of adaptive amino acid substitutions, followed by a tightening of purifying selection within the Drosophila clade. Sequences of the paralogue sister-or-Sex-lethal, in contrast, show a signature of rampant positive selection and relaxation of purifying selection. The recruitment of Sex-lethal as top regulator and memory gene is associated with a significant release from purifying selection in transformer throughout the Drosophila clade. In addition, doublesex shows a signature of positive selection and relaxation of purifying selection in the Drosophila clade. A similar pattern is seen in sequences from the sister Tephritidae clade. CONCLUSIONS: The pattern of molecular evolution we observe for Sex-lethal and its paralogue sister-or-Sex-lethal is not characteristic of a duplication followed by neo-functionalization. Rather, evidence suggests a sub-functionalization scenario achieved through the evolution of sophisticated splicing. As expected, we find that transformer evolves under relaxed purifying selection after the recruitment of Sex-lethal in Drosophila. Finally, the observation of doublesex adaptation in both Drosophila and Tephritidae suggests that these changes are due to ongoing adaptation of downstream sex-specific regulation, rather than being associated the recruitment of Sex-lethal and the resulting change in the topology of the sex determining cascade.

Dataset Information

The Drosophila Myc gene, diminutive, is a positive regulator of the Sex-lethal establishment promoter, Sxl-Pe.

Publications

The Drosophila Myc gene, diminutive, is a positive regulator of the Sex-lethal establishment promoter, Sxl-Pe.

Similar Datasets

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