Molecular Biology and Evolution, Vol 16, 1675-1686, Copyright © 1999 by Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution
Z Tu and JJ Hill
A novel family of non-long-terminal-repeat (non-LTR) retrotransposons,
named MosquI, was discovered in the yellow fever mosquito, Aedes aegypti.
There were approximately 14 copies of MosquI in the A. aegypti genome. Four
of the five analyzed MosquI elements were truncated at the 5' ends while
one of them, MosquI-Aa2, was full-length. All five MosquI elements ended
with 4-10 TAA tandem repeats, as the Drosophila I factors do.
Interestingly, MosquI elements were often found near genes and other
repetitive elements. The 6,623-bp MosquI-Aa2 contained two open reading
frames (ORFs) flanked by a 404-bp 5' untranslated region and a 326-bp 3'
untranslated region. The two ORFs code for nucleocapsids, endonuclease,
reverse transcriptase, and RNase H domains. Although overall structural and
sequence comparisons suggest that MosquI is highly similar to the
Drosophila I factors, phylogenetic analysis based on the reverse
transcriptase domains of 40 non-LTR retrotransposons indicate that MosquI
and I factors are likely paralogous elements which may have been separated
before the split between the ancestors of mollusca and arthropoda. Pairwise
comparisons between the four truncated MosquI elements showed 96.7%-99.5%
identity at the nucleotide level, while comparisons between the full-length
MosquI-Aa2 and the truncated copies showed only 80.2%-81.8% identity. These
comparisons and preliminary phylogenetic analyses suggest that the
full-length and truncated MosquI elements may belong to two subfamilies
originating from two source genes that diverged a long time ago. In
contrast to the defective I factors in Drosophila melanogaster, which are
likely very old components of the genome, the truncated MosquI elements
seem to have been recently active. Finally, the genomic distribution and
evolution of MosquI elements are analyzed in the context of other non-LTR
retrotransposons in A. aegypti.
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
MosquI, a novel family of mosquito retrotransposons distantly related to the Drosophila I factors, may consist of elements of more than one origin
Department of Biochemistry, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg 24061, USA.
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