Molecular Biology and Evolution 18:639-647 (2001)
© 2001 Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution
ARTICLE |
Molecular Evolution of Transferrin: Evidence for Positive Selection in Salmonids
National Marine Fisheries Service, Northwest Fisheries Science Center, Conservation Biology Division, Seattle, Washington
Transferrins are iron-binding proteins that are involved in iron storage and resistance to bacterial disease. Previous work has shown that nonsynonymous-to-synonymous-site substitution ratios (dn/ds ratios) between transferrin genes from some salmonid species were significantly greater than 1.0, providing evidence for positive selection at the transferrin gene. The purpose of the current study was to put these earlier results in a broader evolutionary context by examining variation among 25 previously published transferrin sequences from fish, amphibians, and mammals. The results of the study show that evidence for positive selection at transferrin is limited to salmonids—dn/ds ratios estimated for nonsalmonid lineages were generally less than 1.0. Within the salmonids, 
13% of the transferrin codon sites are estimated to be subject to positive selection, with an estimated dn/ds ratio of 7. The three- dimensional locations of some of the selected sites were inferred by comparing these sites to homologous sites in the bovine lactoferrin crystallographic structure. The selected sites generally fall on the outside of the molecule, within and near areas that are bound by transferrin-binding proteins from human pathogenic bacteria. The physical locations of sites estimated to be subject to positive selection support previous speculation that competition for iron from pathogenic bacteria could be the source of positive selection.
CiteULike 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us What's this?
This article has been cited by other articles:
|
|
 |
|
  D. J. Wilson and G. McVean Estimating Diversifying Selection and Functional Constraint in the Presence of Recombination Genetics, March 1, 2006; 172(3): 1411 - 1425. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 T. C. Spady, O. Seehausen, E. R. Loew, R. C. Jordan, T. D. Kocher, and K. L. Carleton Adaptive Molecular Evolution in the Opsin Genes of Rapidly Speciating Cichlid Species Mol. Biol. Evol., June 1, 2005; 22(6): 1412 - 1422. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
Z. Yang, W. S.W. Wong, and R. Nielsen Bayes Empirical Bayes Inference of Amino Acid Sites Under Positive Selection Mol. Biol. Evol., April 1, 2005; 22(4): 1107 - 1118. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
J. G. Bishop, D. R. Ripoll, S. Bashir, C. M. B. Damasceno, J. D. Seeds, and J. K. C. Rose Selection on Glycine {beta}-1,3-Endoglucanase Genes Differentially Inhibited by a Phytophthora Glucanase Inhibitor Protein Genetics, February 1, 2005; 169(2): 1009 - 1019. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
L. Yang and J.-F. Gui Positive Selection on Multiple Antique Allelic Lineages of Transferrin in the Polyploid Carassius auratus Mol. Biol. Evol., July 1, 2004; 21(7): 1264 - 1277. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
H. Johannesson, P. Vidal, J. Guarro, R. A. Herr, G. T. Cole, and J. W. Taylor Positive Directional Selection in the Proline-Rich Antigen (PRA) Gene Among the Human Pathogenic Fungi Coccidioides immitis, C. posadasii and Their Closest Relatives Mol. Biol. Evol., June 1, 2004; 21(6): 1134 - 1145. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
G. H. Pogson and K. A. Mesa Positive Darwinian Selection at the Pantophysin (Pan I) Locus in Marine Gadid Fishes Mol. Biol. Evol., January 1, 2004; 21(1): 65 - 75. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
M. Anisimova, R. Nielsen, and Z. Yang Effect of Recombination on the Accuracy of the Likelihood Method for Detecting Positive Selection at Amino Acid Sites Genetics, July 1, 2003; 164(3): 1229 - 1236. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 X. Bailly, R. Leroy, S. Carney, O. Collin, F. Zal, A. Toulmond, and D. Jollivet The loss of the hemoglobin H2S-binding function in annelids from sulfide-free habitats reveals molecular adaptation driven by Darwinian positive selection PNAS, May 13, 2003; 100(10): 5885 - 5890. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
A. Antunes, A. R. Templeton, R. Guyomard, and P. Alexandrino The Role of Nuclear Genes in Intraspecific Evolutionary Inference: Genealogy of the transferrin Gene in the Brown Trout Mol. Biol. Evol., August 1, 2002; 19(8): 1272 - 1287. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
T. Dagan, Y. Talmor, and D. Graur Ratios of Radical to Conservative Amino Acid Replacement are Affected by Mutational and Compositional Factors and May Not Be Indicative of Positive Darwinian Selection Mol. Biol. Evol., July 1, 2002; 19(7): 1022 - 1025. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|
|
|
|
|
Z. Yang and W. J. Swanson Codon-Substitution Models to Detect Adaptive Evolution that Account for Heterogeneous Selective Pressures Among Site Classes Mol. Biol. Evol., January 1, 2002; 19(1): 49 - 57. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]
|
|