A survey of intron sequence amplified polymorphism (ISAP) in conjunction with sequence characterized amplified region (SCAR) was carried out to examine the genetic relationships among 14 Dioscorea polystachya cultivars and identify the most popular cultivar ?Tiegun?. Our results revealed that there is a high level of polymorphism among these cultivars. Furthermore, in this study, ISAP markers were consistent with the morphological characters of Dioscorea polystachya cultivars and previous hypotheses on the classification of these cultivars into 2 groups via leaf and tuber shapes have been confirmed. Based on morphological characters and molecular data, we show for the first time that D. doryphora might be a single species and another progenitor of these cultivars. An ISAP fragment specific to the ?Tiegun? cultivar was converted into a SCAR marker. This marker could be used to discriminate the ?Tiegun? cultivar from the other 13 cultivars. Overall, the results of our study provide the foundations for subsequent breeding programs or conservation actions.
Abstract This study is arising from Van den Eynden J. et al. Nature Genetics. Lack of detectable neoantigen depletion signals in the untreated cancer genome. Van den Eynden J. et al. tried to address a very important scientific question: could the immune system eliminate cancer cells with immunogenic mutations in untreated situation? Van den Eynden J. et al. first annotated the human exome into “HLA-binding regions” and “non HLA-binding regions” based on the predicted binding affinity of nonapeptides translated from the un-mutated reference coding genome with type I HLA alleles. They hypothesized that if neoantigen depletion signal exist, the nonsynonymous mutations in “HLA-binding regions” will be negatively selected during cancer evolution, while nonsynonymous mutation in “non HLA-binding regions” will not be negatively selected. This will lead to decreased nonsynonymous vs synonymous mutation ratio (n/s) in “HLA-binding regions” compared with “non HLA-binding regions”. They defined HLA-binding mutation ratio (HBMR) as the ratio of n/s in “HLA-binding regions” to “non HLA-binding regions”, and reported that HBMRs are close to 1 in different types of cancer after background corrections, meaning neoantigen depletion signals are not detectable in different types of cancer. The fundamental problem of their hypothesis lies in that the actual neoantigens with immunogenicity do not overlap with their defined “HLA-binding regions”. Actually, most neoantigens with immunogenicity are not located in “HLA-binding regions”, when dissimilarity between mutant and wild type peptide are considered. It is the neoantigen with immunogenicity, but not nonsynonymous mutation in their defined “HLA-binding regions” undergo immunoediting based negative selection. Thus the results reported in that study are fundamentally flawed, and at this current stage we could not draw a solid conclusion as to whether the neoantigen depletion signal exists or not.
Secale cereale is an important crop in the Triticeae tribe of the Poaceae family, and it has unique agronomic characteristics and genome properties. It possesses resistance to many diseases and serves as an important resource for the breeding of other Triticeae crops. We performed a genome-wide study on S. cereale to identify the largest group of plant disease resistance genes (R genes), the nucleotide-binding site-leucine-rich repeat receptor (NBS-LRR) genes. In its genome, 582 NBS-LRR genes were identified, including one from the RNL subclass and 581 from the CNL subclass. The NBS-LRR gene number in the S. cereale genome is greater than that in barley and the diploid wheat genomes. S. cereale chromosome 4 contains the largest number of NBS-LRR genes among the seven chromosomes, which is different from the pattern in barley and the genomes B and D of wheat but similar to that in the genome A of wheat. Further synteny analysis suggests that more NBS-LRR genes on chromosome 4 have been inherited from a common ancestor by S. cereale and the wheat genome A than the wheat genomes B and D. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that at least 740 NBS-LRR lineages are present in the common ancestor of S. cereale, Hordeum vulgare and Triticum urartu. However, most of them have only been inherited by one or two species, with only 65 of them preserved in all three species. The S. cereale genome inherited 382 of these ancestral NBS-LRR lineages, but 120 of them have been lost in both H. vulgare and T. urartu. This study provides the full NBS-LRR profile of the S. cereale genome, which is a resource for S. cereale breeding and indicates that S. cereale can be an important material for the molecular breeding of other Triticeae crops.
The fatty acid elongase 1 (FAE1) gene catalyzes the initial condensation step in the elongation pathway of VLCFA (very long chain fatty acid) biosynthesis and is thus a key gene in erucic acid biosynthesis. Based on a worldwide collection of 62 accessions representing 14 tribes, 31 genera, 51 species, 4 subspecies and 7 varieties, we conducted a phylogenetic reconstruction and correlation analysis between genetic variations in the FAE1 gene and the erucic acid trait, attempting to gain insight into the evolutionary patterns and the correlations between genetic variations in FAE1 and trait variations. The five clear, deeply diverged clades detected in the phylogenetic reconstruction are largely congruent with a previous multiple gene-derived phylogeny. The Ka/Ks ratio (<1) and overall low level of nucleotide diversity in the FAE1 gene suggest that purifying selection is the major evolutionary force acting on this gene. Sequence variations in FAE1 show a strong correlation with the content of erucic acid in seeds, suggesting a causal link between the two. Furthermore, we detected 16 mutations that were fixed between the low and high phenotypes of the FAE1 gene, which constitute candidate active sites in this gene for altering the content of erucic acid in seeds. Our findings begin to shed light on the evolutionary pattern of this important gene and represent the first step in elucidating how the sequence variations impact the production of erucic acid in plants.
Abstract Five microsatellite loci have been isolated and characterized from a cDNA library of Oliver flounder, Paralichthys olivaceus . All loci were found to be polymorphic and had between four and 10 alleles. Observed and expected heterozygosities varied from 0.70 to 0.90 and from 0.52 to 0.80, respectively. Five additional fish species assessed for cross‐species amplification revealed between zero and three positive amplifications and between zero and two polymorphic loci per species.
Wild Brassica juncea is a widespread weed in China with increasingly great impact on the yield of many crops.This study aimed to develop microsatellite markers for assessing the genetic diversity and population genetic structure of B. juncea, and to provide basic information for biological and chemical control of the weed.The compound microsatellite marker technique was used to develop markers for investigating population genetics of wild B. juncea.Twelve loci were obtained, each of which showed high polymorphisms when tested in two populations in Sichuan and Jiangsu Provinces.The number of alleles per locus ranged from 4 to 27, with an average of 15.2 alleles per locus.The newly developed microsatellite loci will be informative for further investigations of the population genetics and evolutionary patterns of wild B. juncea.
Water chestnut ( Trapa natans L.) is a group of annual, floating-leaved aquatic plants that serves as food and medical resources in many countries. However, the molecular method for distinguishing different T. natans L. resources is lacking. In this study, we detected genetic diversity of several chloroplast and nuclear genic or intergenic sequences in four varieties of T. natans and one wild type of Trapa incisa Siebold & Zuccarini to evaluate their potential as molecular markers. Our data revealed that the three chloroplast fragments ( rbcL , matK , and pbsA-trnH ) show no sequence difference among all tested samples. Only one nucleotide substitution is detected for the nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) in the T. natans variety Shuihongling. Four nucleotide substitutions are detected for the nuclear carotenoid isomerase ( CRTISO ) gene in the variety Hongxiuxie. In contrast, a total of 29 polymorphic sites are detected for a Toll and interleukin-1 receptor-nucleotide binding site–leucine rich repeat ( TNL ) gene in the five samples, among which six are nucleotide substitutions and the rest are insertions/deletions. The five samples could be fully distinguished from each other based on the TNL gene. To specifically authenticate ‘Heshangling’, 33 randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers were adopted to amplify genomic sequences from the five samples. A pair of sequence characterized amplified region (SCAR) primers were designed based on the results of RAPD markers, which could specifically amplify one target band from all eight individuals of ‘Heshangling’, but none from any individuals of other T. natans varieties or one T. incisa . Taken together, a TNL sequence was provided in this study to distinguish four T. natans varieties and one T. incisa . Furthermore, a RAPD-SCAR marker was developed for efficient authentication of ‘Heshangling’.