An epigenetic clock in plants

DNA methylation can identify evolutionary relationships among close plant lineages Molecular clocks are analytical tools that count the DNA sequence differences between orthologous genomic regions of related organisms to identify when their evolutionary lineages diverged ( 1 ). This approach assumes...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science) 2023-09, Vol.381 (6665), p.1416-1416
Main Author: Satyaki, P. R. V.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Archaeology
Clocks
Coronaviruses
Deoxyribonucleic acid
DNA
Epigenetics
Gene sequencing
Mutation
Nucleotide sequence
Plant breeding
Plant populations
Populations
Severe acute respiratory syndrome
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2
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Summary:DNA methylation can identify evolutionary relationships among close plant lineages Molecular clocks are analytical tools that count the DNA sequence differences between orthologous genomic regions of related organisms to identify when their evolutionary lineages diverged ( 1 ). This approach assumes that mutations that do not affect an organism’s fitness (neutral mutations) accumulate at a constant rate. Over the past ∽60 years, molecular clocks have helped fill gaps in the fossil record, assisted in conservation programs ( 2 ), and enabled the tracking of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV-2) variants ( 1 , 3 ). However, current molecular clocks struggle to map relationships between recently diverged populations with few DNA sequence differences. On page 1440 of this issue, Yao et al. ( 4 ) describe a molecular clock that overcomes this shortcoming in self-pollinating (selfing) and clonal (vegetatively propagated) plant populations by counting epigenetic mutations (epimutations), which occur faster than DNA sequence mutations. The new tool has potential applications in plant breeding and the study of ecology, evolution, and archaeology.
ISSN:0036-8075
1095-9203
DOI:10.1126/science.adk2696