Molecular Biology and Evolution, Vol 12, 405-414, Copyright © 1995 by Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution
C Claudianos and HD Campbell
The Drosophila melanogaster gene flightless-I, involved in gastrulation and
muscle degeneration, has Caenorhabditis elegans and human homologues. In
these highly conserved genes, two previously known gene families have been
brought together, families encoding the actin- binding proteins related to
gelsolin and the leucine-rich-repeat (LRR) group of proteins involved in
protein-protein interactions. Both these gene families exhibit
characteristics of molecular changes involving replication slippage and
exon shuffling. Phylogenetic analyses of 19 amino acid sequences of 6
related protein types indicate that actin- associated proteins related to
gelsolin are monophyletic to a common ancestor and include flightless
proteins. Conversely, comparison of 24 amino acid sequences of LRR proteins
including the flightless proteins indicates that flightless proteins are
members of a structurally related subgroup. Included in the flightless
cluster are human and mouse rsp-1 proteins involved in suppressing v-Ras
transformation of cells and the membrane-associated yeast (Saccharomyces
cerevisae) adenylate cyclase whose analogous LRRs are required for
interaction with Ras proteins. There is a strong possibility that ligands
for this group could be related and that flightless may have a similar role
in Ras signal transduction. It is hypothesized that an ancestral monomeric
gelsolin precursor protein has undergone at least four independent gene
reorganization events to account for the structural diversity of the extant
family of gelsolin-related proteins and that gene duplication and exon
shuffling events occurred prior to or at the beginning of multicellular
life, resulting in the evolution of some members of the family soon after
the appearance of actin-type proteins.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
The novel flightless-I gene brings together two gene families, actin- binding proteins related to gelsolin and leucine-rich-repeat proteins involved in Ras signal transduction
Division of Botany and Zoology, Australian National University, Canberra.
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