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Gene regulatory dynamics during craniofacial development in a carnivorous marsupial

ABSTRACT: Marsupials and placental mammals exhibit significant differences in reproductive and life history strategies. Marsupials are born highly underdeveloped after an extremely short period of gestation, leading to prioritization of the development of structures critical for post-birth survival in the pouch. Critically, they must undergo accelerated development of the oro-facial region compared to placentals. Previously we described the accelerated development of the oro-facial region in the carnivorous Australian marsupial, the fat-tailed dunnart Sminthopsis crassicaudata that has one of the shortest gestations of any mammal. By combining genome comparisons of the mouse and dunnart with functional data for the enhancer-associated chromatin modifications, H3K4me3 and H3K27ac, we investigated divergence of craniofacial regulatory landscapes between these species. While genes involved in regulating facial development were largely conserved in mouse and dunnart, the regulatory landscape varied significantly. Additionally, a subset of dunnart-specific enhancers were associated with genes highly expressed only in dunnart relating to cranial neural crest proliferation, embryonic myogenesis and epidermis development. Comparative RNA-seq analyses of facial tissue revealed dunnart-specific expression of genes involved in the development of the mechanosensory system. Accelerated development of the dunnart sensory system likely relates to the sensory cues received by the nasal-oral region during the postnatal journey to the pouch. Together these data suggest that accelerated development in the dunnart can be driven by dunnart-specific enhancer activity. Our study highlights the power of marsupial-placental comparative genomics for understanding the role of enhancers in driving temporal shifts in development.

ORGANISM(S): Sminthopsis crassicaudata

PROVIDER: GSE188990 | GEO | 2023/03/15

REPOSITORIES: GEO

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Project description:Production of milk is a key characteristic of mammals, but the features of lactation vary greatly between monotreme, marsupial and eutherian mammals. Marsupials have a short gestation followed by a long lactation period, and the milk constituents vary greatly across lactation to meet the changing needs of the developing young. Marsupials are born immunologically naïve and rely on their mother’s milk for immunological protection. The koala is an iconic Australian species and many are increasingly threatened by disease. Here we use a mammary transcriptome, two milk proteomes and the koala genome to comprehensively characterise the protein components of the milk of the koala, with a key focus on the immune constituents during early and late lactation. We have characterised the most abundant peptides present in milk, examined key differences between early and late lactation, and determined differences between the koala and other marsupial species. The most abundant proteins were well characterised mammalian and marsupial-specific milk proteins including β-lactoglobulin, lactotransferrin, caseins and early lactation protein. We have generated a list of 851 immune compounds identified in the mammary transcriptome and examined a range of immune proteins that were highly abundant in the milk proteomes. These include immunoglobulins, complement components and immune receptors. A host of antimicrobial peptides were identified including cathelicidins, lysozyme, WAP four-disulfide core domain protein 2, Mucin-1 and Peptidoglycan recognition protein. We discovered that the previously described marsupial milk protein Very Early Lactation Protein is an ortholog of the eutherian gene Glycam1 (PP3) and likely has an antimicrobial role in milk. We also identified highly abundant koala endogenous retrovirus sequences in the mammary and milk transcriptome and proteomes, identifying a potential route for retroviral transmission from mother to young. Identifying and characterising the immune components of milk is key to understanding how marsupial young are protected throughout lactation and the novel immune compounds identified may have applications in clinical research.

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Gene regulatory dynamics during craniofacial development in a carnivorous marsupial

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