Evolutionary breakpoint analysis on Y chromosomes of higher primates provides insight into human Y evolution

2004 ◽  
Vol 108 (1-3) ◽  
pp. 204-210 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Wimmer ◽  
S. Kirsch ◽  
G.A. Rappold ◽  
W. Schempp
Genetics ◽  
1990 ◽  
Vol 125 (3) ◽  
pp. 527-534 ◽  
Author(s):  
A G Clark

Abstract Deficiency mapping with Y autosome translocations has shown that the Y chromosome of Drosophila melanogaster carries genes that are essential to male fertility. While the qualitative behavior of these lesions provides important insight into the physiological importance of the Y chromosome, quantitative variation in effects on male fertility among extant Y chromosomes in natural populations may have a significant effect on the evolution of the Y chromosome. Here a series of 36 Y chromosome replacement lines were tested in two ways designed to detect subtle variation in effects on male fertility and total male fitness. The first test involved crossing males from the 36 lines to an excess of females in an attempt to measure differences in male mating success (virility) and male fecundity. The second test challenged males bearing each of the 36 Y chromosomes to competition in populations with males bearing a standard, phenotypically marked (BsY) chromosome. These tests indicated that the Y chromosome lines did not differ significantly in either male fertility or total fitness, but that interactions with autosomes approached significance. A deterministic population genetic model was developed allowing Y autosome interaction in fertility, and it is shown that, consistent with the experimental observations, this model cannot protect Y-linked polymorphism.


Author(s):  
Daniel W. Bellott ◽  
David C. Page

AbstractDifferent ancestral autosomes independently evolved into sex chromosomes in snakes, birds, and mammals. In snakes and birds, females are ZW, while males are ZZ; in mammals, females are XX and males are XY. While X and Z chromosomes retain nearly all ancestral genes, sex-specific W and Y chromosomes suffered extensive genetic decay. In both birds and mammals, the genes that survived on sex-specific chromosomes are enriched for broadly expressed, dosage sensitive regulators of gene expression, subject to strong purifying selection. To gain deeper insight into the processes that govern survival on sex-specific chromosomes, we carried out a meta-analysis of survival across 41 species — three snakes, 24 birds and 14 mammals — doubling the number of ancestral genes under investigation and increasing our power to detect enrichments among survivors relative to non-survivors. Out of 2573 ancestral genes, representing an eighth of the ancestral amniote genome, only 322 survive on present-day sex-specific chromosomes. Survivors are enriched for dosage sensitive developmental processes, particularly development of the face. However, there was no enrichment for expression in sex-specific tissues, involvement in sex-determination or gonadogenesis pathways, or conserved sex-biased expression. Broad expression and dosage sensitivity contributed independently to gene survival, suggesting that pleiotropy imposes additional constraints on the evolution of dosage compensation. We propose that maintaining the viability of the heterogametic sex drove gene survival on amniote sex-specific chromosomes, and that subtle modulation of the expression of survivor genes and their autosomal orthologs has disproportionately large effects on development and disease.


2010 ◽  
Vol 107 (5) ◽  
pp. 1912-1917 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jee Young An ◽  
Eun-A. Kim ◽  
Yonghua Jiang ◽  
Adriana Zakrzewska ◽  
Dong Eun Kim ◽  
...  

Ubiquitination of histones provides an important mechanism regulating chromatin remodeling and gene expression. Recent studies have revealed ubiquitin ligases involved in histone ubiquitination, yet the responsible enzymes and the function of histone ubiquitination in spermatogenesis remain unclear. We have previously shown that mice lacking the ubiquitin ligase UBR2, one of the recognition E3 components of the N-end rule proteolytic pathway, are infertile associated with meiotic arrest at prophase I. We here show that UBR2 localizes to meiotic chromatin regions, including unsynapsed axial elements linked to chromatin inactivation, and mediates transcriptional silencing via the ubiquitination of histone H2A. UBR2 interacts with the ubiquitin conjugating enzyme HR6B and its substrate H2A and promotes the HR6B–H2A interaction and the HR6B-to-H2A transfer of ubiquitin. UBR2 and ubiquitinated H2A (uH2A) spatiotemporally mark meiotic chromatin regions subject to transcriptional silencing, and UBR2-deficient spermatocytes fail to induce the ubiquitination of H2A during meiosis. UBR2-deficient spermatocytes are profoundly impaired in chromosome-wide transcriptional silencing of genes linked to unsynapsed axes of the X and Y chromosomes. Our findings suggest that insufficiency in UBR2-dependent histone ubiquitination triggers a pachytene checkpoint system, providing a new insight into chromatin remodeling and gene expression regulation.


1966 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 322-330
Author(s):  
A. Beer

The investigations which I should like to summarize in this paper concern recent photo-electric luminosity determinations of O and B stars. Their final aim has been the derivation of new stellar distances, and some insight into certain patterns of galactic structure.


1984 ◽  
Vol 75 ◽  
pp. 461-469 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert W. Hart

ABSTRACTThis paper models maximum entropy configurations of idealized gravitational ring systems. Such configurations are of interest because systems generally evolve toward an ultimate state of maximum randomness. For simplicity, attention is confined to ultimate states for which interparticle interactions are no longer of first order importance. The planets, in their orbits about the sun, are one example of such a ring system. The extent to which the present approximation yields insight into ring systems such as Saturn's is explored briefly.


Author(s):  
D. F. Blake ◽  
L. F. Allard ◽  
D. R. Peacor

Echinodermata is a phylum of marine invertebrates which has been extant since Cambrian time (c.a. 500 m.y. before the present). Modern examples of echinoderms include sea urchins, sea stars, and sea lilies (crinoids). The endoskeletons of echinoderms are composed of plates or ossicles (Fig. 1) which are with few exceptions, porous, single crystals of high-magnesian calcite. Despite their single crystal nature, fracture surfaces do not exhibit the near-perfect {10.4} cleavage characteristic of inorganic calcite. This paradoxical mix of biogenic and inorganic features has prompted much recent work on echinoderm skeletal crystallography. Furthermore, fossil echinoderm hard parts comprise a volumetrically significant portion of some marine limestones sequences. The ultrastructural and microchemical characterization of modern skeletal material should lend insight into: 1). The nature of the biogenic processes involved, for example, the relationship of Mg heterogeneity to morphological and structural features in modern echinoderm material, and 2). The nature of the diagenetic changes undergone by their ancient, fossilized counterparts. In this study, high resolution TEM (HRTEM), high voltage TEM (HVTEM), and STEM microanalysis are used to characterize tha ultrastructural and microchemical composition of skeletal elements of the modern crinoid Neocrinus blakei.


Author(s):  
Peter Sterling

The synaptic connections in cat retina that link photoreceptors to ganglion cells have been analyzed quantitatively. Our approach has been to prepare serial, ultrathin sections and photograph en montage at low magnification (˜2000X) in the electron microscope. Six series, 100-300 sections long, have been prepared over the last decade. They derive from different cats but always from the same region of retina, about one degree from the center of the visual axis. The material has been analyzed by reconstructing adjacent neurons in each array and then identifying systematically the synaptic connections between arrays. Most reconstructions were done manually by tracing the outlines of processes in successive sections onto acetate sheets aligned on a cartoonist's jig. The tracings were then digitized, stacked by computer, and printed with the hidden lines removed. The results have provided rather than the usual one-dimensional account of pathways, a three-dimensional account of circuits. From this has emerged insight into the functional architecture.


Author(s):  
J. J. Laidler ◽  
B. Mastel

One of the major materials problems encountered in the development of fast breeder reactors for commercial power generation is the phenomenon of swelling in core structural components and fuel cladding. This volume expansion, which is due to the retention of lattice vacancies by agglomeration into large polyhedral clusters (voids), may amount to ten percent or greater at goal fluences in some austenitic stainless steels. From a design standpoint, this is an undesirable situation, and it is necessary to obtain experimental confirmation that such excessive volume expansion will not occur in materials selected for core applications in the Fast Flux Test Facility, the prototypic LMFBR now under construction at the Hanford Engineering Development Laboratory (HEDL). The HEDL JEM-1000 1 MeV electron microscope is being used to provide an insight into trends of radiation damage accumulation in stainless steels, since it is possible to produce atom displacements at an accelerated rate with 1 MeV electrons, while the specimen is under continuous observation.


Author(s):  
John R. Devaney

Occasionally in history, an event may occur which has a profound influence on a technology. Such an event occurred when the scanning electron microscope became commercially available to industry in the mid 60's. Semiconductors were being increasingly used in high-reliability space and military applications both because of their small volume but, also, because of their inherent reliability. However, they did fail, both early in life and sometimes in middle or old age. Why they failed and how to prevent failure or prolong “useful life” was a worry which resulted in a blossoming of sophisticated failure analysis laboratories across the country. By 1966, the ability to build small structure integrated circuits was forging well ahead of techniques available to dissect and analyze these same failures. The arrival of the scanning electron microscope gave these analysts a new insight into failure mechanisms.


Author(s):  
D. R. Liu ◽  
S. S. Shinozaki ◽  
J. S. Park ◽  
B. N. Juterbock

The electric and thermal properties of the resistor material in an automotive spark plug should be stable during its service lifetime. Containing many elements and many phases, this material has a very complex microstructure. Elemental mapping with an electron microprobe can reveal the distribution of all relevant elements throughout the sample. In this work, it is demonstrated that the charge-up effect, which would distort an electron image and, therefore, is normally to be avoided in an electron imaging work, could be used to advantage to reveal conductive and resistive zones in a sample. Its combination with elemental mapping can provide valuable insight into the underlying conductivity mechanism of the resistor.This work was performed in a CAMECA SX-50 microprobe. The spark plug used in the present report was a commercial product taken from the shelf. It was sectioned to expose the cross section of the resistor. The resistor was known not to contain the precious metal Au as checked on the carbon coated sample. The sample was then stripped of carbon coating and re-coated with Au.


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