Diverse gene regulatory mechanisms alter rattlesnake venom gene expression at fine evolutionary scales
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ABSTRACT: Understanding and predicting the relationships between genotype and phenotype is often challenging, largely due to the complex nature of eukaryotic gene regulation. A step towards this goal is to map how phenotypic variation evolves through genomic changes that modify gene regulatory interactions. Using the Prairie Rattlesnake (Crotalus viridis) and related species, we integrate mRNA-seq, proteomic, ATAC-seq and whole genome resequencing data to understand how specific evolutionary modifications to gene regulatory network components produce variation in venom gene expression. Through comparisons within and between species, we find a remarkably high degree of gene expression and regulatory network variation across even a shallow level of evolutionary divergence. We use these data to test hypotheses about the roles of specific trans-factors and cis-regulatory elements, how these roles may vary across venom genes and gene families, and how variation in regulatory systems drive variation in venom phenotypes. Our results illustrate that variation in chromatin and genotype at regulatory elements plays major roles in modulating expression. However, we also find that enhancer deletions, variation in transcription-factor expression, and variation in activity of the insulator protein CTCF also impact downstream venom phenotypes. Our findings provide insight into the diversity and gene-specificity of gene regulatory features and highlight the value of comparative studies to link gene regulatory network variation to phenotypic variation.
ORGANISM(S): Crotalus concolor Crotalus lutosus Crotalus viridis
PROVIDER: GSE254420 | GEO | 2024/07/17
REPOSITORIES: GEO
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