Evolutionary history of the HAP2/GCS1 gene and sexual reproduction in metazoans

The HAP2/GCS1 gene first appeared in the common ancestor of plants, animals, and protists, and is required in the male gamete for fusion to the female gamete in the unicellular organisms Chlamydomonas and Plasmodium. We have identified a HAP2/GCS1 gene in the genome sequence of the sponge Amphimedon...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2009-11, Vol.4 (11), p.e7680-e7680
Main Authors: Steele, Robert E, Dana, Catherine E
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Acropora palmata
Amino Acid Sequence
Amino acids
Amphimedon
Amphimedon queenslandica
Animals
Apis mellifera
Arabidopsis
Arthropoda
Arthropods
Bacterial Proteins - genetics
Bacterial Proteins - physiology
Base Sequence
BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES
Cell Lineage
Chlamydomonas
Chlamydomonas - genetics
Cnidaria
Culicidae
Developmental biology
Developmental Biology/Germ Cells
Diptera
Evolution, Molecular
Evolutionary biology
Evolutionary Biology/Developmental Evolution
Evolutionary Biology/Genomics
Female
Gene expression
Gene Expression Regulation
Genes
Genetics and Genomics/Genomics
Genomes
Genomics
Hydra
Hydra - genetics
Hypotheses
invertebrate genomics
Male
Marine
Metazoa
Molecular Sequence Data
Morphology
Nematostella
Nematostella vectensis
Nucleotide sequence
Phylogenetics
Plasmodium
Plasmodium - genetics
Porifera - genetics
Proteins
Reproduction
Reproduction (biology)
sequence alignment
Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
Sexual reproduction
Sperm
Spermatogenesis
Tribolium
Trichoplax
Trichoplax adhaerens
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Summary:The HAP2/GCS1 gene first appeared in the common ancestor of plants, animals, and protists, and is required in the male gamete for fusion to the female gamete in the unicellular organisms Chlamydomonas and Plasmodium. We have identified a HAP2/GCS1 gene in the genome sequence of the sponge Amphimedon queenslandica. This finding provides a continuous evolutionary history of HAP2/GCS1 from unicellular organisms into the metazoan lineage. Divergent versions of the HAP2/GCS1 gene are also present in the genomes of some but not all arthropods. By examining the expression of the HAP2/GCS1 gene in the cnidarian Hydra, we have found the first evidence supporting the hypothesis that HAP2/GCS1 was used for male gamete fusion in the ancestor of extant metazoans and that it retains that function in modern cnidarians.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0007680