RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Firefly genomes illuminate parallel origins of bioluminescence in beetles
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 237586
DO 10.1101/237586
A1 Timothy R. Fallon
A1 Sarah E. Lower
A1 Ching-Ho Chang
A1 Manabu Bessho-Uehara
A1 Gavin J. Martin
A1 Adam J. Bewick
A1 Megan Behringer
A1 Humberto J. Debat
A1 Isaac Wong
A1 John C. Day
A1 Anton Suvorov
A1 Christian J. Silva
A1 Kathrin F. Stanger-Hall
A1 David W. Hall
A1 Robert J. Schmitz
A1 David R. Nelson
A1 Sara M. Lewis
A1 Shuji Shigenobu
A1 Seth M. Bybee
A1 Amanda M. Larracuente
A1 Yuichi Oba
A1 Jing-Ke Weng
YR 2018
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2018/02/25/237586.abstract
AB Fireflies and their fascinating luminous courtships have inspired centuries of scientific study. Today firefly luciferase is widely used in biotechnology, but the evolutionary origin of their bioluminescence remains unclear. To shed light on this long-standing question, we sequenced the genomes of two firefly species that diverged over 100 million-years-ago: the North American Photinus pyralis and Japanese Aquatica lateralis. We also sequenced the genome of a related click-beetle, the Caribbean Ignelater luminosus, with bioluminescent biochemistry near-identical to fireflies, but anatomically unique light organs, suggesting the intriguing but contentious hypothesis of parallel gains of bioluminescence. Our analyses support two independent gains of bioluminescence between fireflies and click-beetles, and provide new insights into the genes, chemical defenses, and symbionts that evolved alongside their luminous lifestyle.One Sentence Summary: Comparative analyses of the first linkage-group-resolution genomes of fireflies and related bioluminescent beetles address long-standing questions of the origin and evolution of bioluminescence and its associated traits.