To access this work you must either be on the Smith College campus OR have valid Smith login credentials.
On Campus users: To access this work if you are on campus please Select the Download button.
Off Campus users: To access this work from off campus, please select the Off-Campus button and enter your Smith username and password when prompted.
Non-Smith users: You may request this item through Interlibrary Loan at your own library.
Publication Date
2014
Document Type
Honors Project
Department
Biological Sciences
Keywords
Genetic transformation, Bacteria, Animals, Metazoa, Antibody diversity, Sequestration (Chemistry), Lateral gene transfer, Horizontal gene transfer, Germ line, Sequestration
Abstract
Lateral Gene Transfer (LGT) has long been known to be a major contributor to genome innovation and evolution in bacteria, but remains understudied in animals. Typically, it's suggested that the evolution of a sequestered germ line in metazoa creates a nigh insurmountable obstacle to LGT, but this assumption is yet to be tested. Though studies discovering evidence of LGT in certain animal genomes are beginning to emerge, none have studied LGT rates in early-diverging animals lacking a sequestered germline nor have any attempted to describe the patterns of LGT across the metazoan clade. Here, we show that analyses of single-gene phylogenies built from publically available sequences from over 1239 taxa across all three domains enable estimation of lateral gene transfer events in animal evolutionary history. The results of these analyses show a three-fold difference between the number of genes laterally transferred into bilaterian animals and the number of genes transferred into early-diverging animals without a sequestered germline, providing supportive evidence that a sequestered germline does indeed influence the rate of LGT.
Language
English
Recommended Citation
Jensen, Lindy Mae, "Effects of the evolution of germline sequestration in metazoa on the tempo of interdomain lateral gene transfer" (2014). Honors Project, Smith College, Northampton, MA.
https://scholarworks.smith.edu/theses/42
Smith Only:
Off Campus Download
Comments
100 pages : color illustrations. Honors Project-Smith College, 2014. Includes bibliographical references (pages 26-29)