a novel gene family controls species-specific morphological traits in hydra一种新的基因家族控制着特有的九头蛇的形态特征.pdfVIP

PLoS BIOLOGY A Novel Gene Family Controls Species-Specific Morphological Traits in Hydra * ¨ Konstantin Khalturin, Friederike Anton-Erxleben, Sylvia Sassmann, Jorg Wittlieb, Georg Hemmrich, Thomas C. G. Bosch Zoological Institute, Christian-Albrechts-University, Am Botanishen Garten 1-9, 24118 Kiel, Germany Understanding the molecular events that underlie the evolution of morphological diversity is a major challenge in biology. Here, to identify genes whose expression correlates with species-specific morphologies, we compared transcriptomes of two closely related Hydra species. We find that species-specific differences in tentacle formation correlate with expression of a taxonomically restricted gene encoding a small secreted protein. We show that gain of function induces changes in morphology that mirror the phenotypic differences observed between species. These results suggest that ‘‘novel’’ genes may be involved in the generation of species-specific morphological traits. Citation: Khalturin K, Anton-Erxleben F, Sassmann S, Wittlieb J, Hemmrich G, et al. (2008) A novel gene family controls species-specific morphological traits in Hydra. PLoS Biol 6(11): e278. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.0060278 bicoid [23] and spatzle [24]. Recent comparative data on the ¨ Introduction