Extensive Differential Splicing Underlies Phenotypically Plastic Aphid Morphs
Extensive Differential Splicing Underlies Phenotypically Plastic Aphid Morphs
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DOI：
10.1093/molbev/msy095
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发表时间：
2018-08-01
影响因子：
10.7
通讯作者：
Brisson, Jennifer A.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Grantham, Mary E.;Brisson, Jennifer A.
表型可塑性导致单一基因的不同表型对环境线索的反应。为了了解表型可塑性的分子基础，研究集中在环境决定的表型之间的差异基因表达水平。环境决定的表型之间的选择性剪接差异的程度在很大程度上被研究不足。在这里，我们使用RNA序列数据研究了豌豆蚜可塑性生产的不同形态之间的选择性剪接差异。豌豆蚜表现出两种不同的多物性(具有离散表型的可塑性)：一种是由有翼和无翅雌性组成的翅多性；另一种是由无性和有性雌性组成的生殖多物性。我们发现，豌豆蚜虫可以选择性地拼接34%的基因，这对于无脊椎动物来说是一个很高的比例。我们还发现，在基因相同、多表型的雌性之间，差异剪接事件被广泛使用。这些差异剪接事件丰富了外显子跳跃和相互排斥的外显子事件，维持了开放阅读框架，表明多表型变体使用选择性剪接来产生表型偏见的蛋白质。许多在多表型之间差异剪接的基因具有与其各自表型相关的假定功能。我们发现大多数差异剪接的基因都不是差异表达的基因。我们的结果为未来的功能研究提供了一个丰富的候选基因列表，这些研究以前不会仅仅基于基因表达研究，例如生殖多态中的ensconin和翅膀多态中的Caki。总体而言，这项研究表明，选择性剪接在环境决定的表型表达中发挥着重要作用。
Phenotypic plasticity results in a diversity of phenotypes from a single genotype in response to environmental cues. To understand the molecular basis of phenotypic plasticity, studies have focused on differential gene expression levels between environmentally determined phenotypes. The extent of alternative splicing differences among environmentally determined phenotypes has largely been understudied. Here, we study alternative splicing differences among plastically produced morphs of the pea aphid using RNA-sequence data. Pea aphids express two separate polyphenisms (plasticity with discrete phenotypes): a wing polyphenism consisting of winged and wingless females and a reproduction polyphenism consisting of asexual and sexual females. We find that pea aphids alternatively splice 34% of their genes, a high percentage for invertebrates. We also find that there is extensive use of differential spliced events between genetically identical, polyphenic females. These differentially spliced events are enriched for exon skipping and mutually exclusive exon events that maintain the open reading frame, suggesting that polyphenic morphs use alternative splicing to produce phenotype-biased proteins. Many genes that are differentially spliced between polyphenic morphs have putative functions associated with their respective phenotypes. We find that the majority of differentially spliced genes is not differentially expressed genes. Our results provide a rich candidate gene list for future functional studies that would not have been previously considered based solely on gene expression studies, such as ensconsin in the reproductive polyphenism, and CAKI in the wing polyphenism. Overall, this study suggests an important role for alternative splicing in the expression of environmentally determined phenotypes.