Definition of a third VLR gene in hagfish

Jawless vertebrates (cyclostomes) have an alternative adaptive immune system in which lymphocytes somatically diversify their variable lymphocyte receptors (VLR) through recombinatorial use of leucine-rich repeat cassettes during VLR gene assembly. Three types of these anticipatory receptors in lamp...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS 2013-09, Vol.110 (37), p.15013-15018
Main Authors: Li, Jianxu, Das, Sabyasachi, Herrin, Brantley R., Hirano, Masayuki, Cooper, Max D.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adaptive immunity
Adaptive Immunity - genetics
Amino Acid Sequence
Amino acids
Animals
Antigens
B lymphocytes
Base Sequence
Biological Sciences
DNA, Complementary - genetics
Evolution
Evolution, Molecular
Fish
Fish Proteins - chemistry
Fish Proteins - genetics
Fish Proteins - immunology
Genes
Hagfishes - genetics
Hagfishes - immunology
Immune system
Lampreys - genetics
Lampreys - immunology
Lymphocytes
Lymphocytes - immunology
Models, Molecular
Molecular Sequence Data
Myxinidae
Petromyzontidae
Phylogenetics
Phylogeny
Receptors
Receptors, Immunologic - chemistry
Receptors, Immunologic - genetics
Sequence Homology, Amino Acid
Transcriptome
Vertebrates
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Summary:Jawless vertebrates (cyclostomes) have an alternative adaptive immune system in which lymphocytes somatically diversify their variable lymphocyte receptors (VLR) through recombinatorial use of leucine-rich repeat cassettes during VLR gene assembly. Three types of these anticipatory receptors in lampreys (VLRA , VLRB , and VLRC) are expressed by separate lymphocyte lineages. However, only two VLR genes (VLRA and VLRB) have been found in hagfish. Here we have identified a third hagfish VLR , which undergoes somatic assembly to generate sufficient diversity to encode a large repertoire of anticipatory receptors. Sequence analysis, structural comparison, and phylogenetic analysis indicate that the unique hagfish VLR is the counterpart of lamprey VLRA and the previously identified hagfish “VLRA” is the lamprey VLRC counterpart. The demonstration of three orthologous VLR genes in both lampreys and hagfish suggests that this anticipatory receptor system evolved in a common ancestor of the two cyclostome lineages around 480 Mya.
ISSN:0027-8424
1091-6490
DOI:10.1073/pnas.1314540110