RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 The origins of a novel butterfly wing patterning gene from within a family of conserved cell cycle regulators
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 016006
DO 10.1101/016006
A1 Nicola J. Nadeau
A1 Carolina Pardo-Diaz
A1 Annabel Whibley
A1 Megan Supple
A1 Richard Wallbank
A1 Grace C. Wu
A1 Luana Maroja
A1 Laura Ferguson
A1 Heather Hines
A1 Camilo Salazar
A1 Richard ffrench-Constant
A1 Mathieu Joron
A1 W. Owen McMillan
A1 Chris D. Jiggins
YR 2015
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2015/03/05/016006.abstract
AB A major challenge in evolutionary biology is to understand the origins of novel structures. The wing patterns of butterflies and moths are derived phenotypes unique to the Lepidoptera. Here we identify a gene that we name poikilomousa (poik), which regulates colour pattern switches in the mimetic Heliconius butterflies. Strong associations between phenotypic variation and DNA sequence variation are seen in three different Heliconius species, in addition to associations between gene expression and colour pattern. Colour pattern variants are also associated with differences in splicing of poik transcripts. poik is a member of the conserved fizzy family of cell cycle regulators. It belongs to a faster evolving subfamily, the closest functionally characterised orthologue being the cortex gene in Drosophila, a female germ-line specific protein involved in meiosis. poik appears to have adopted a novel function in the Lepidoptera and become a major target for natural selection acting on colour and pattern variation in this group.He,Heliconius eratoHm,Heliconius melpomeneHn,Heliconius numatapoik,poikilomousa