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doi:10.1016/j.gene.2005.03.046 
Copyright © 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Evolution of nuclearly encoded mitochondrial genes in Metazoa
Anna De Grassia, Corrado Caggeseb, Domenica D'Eliaa, Cecilia Lanavea, Graziano Pesolec and Cecilia Sacconea, d, 
, 
Received 15 December 2004;
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Abstract
All Metazoan nuclear genomes underwent a continuous process of both complete and partial genetic material gain and loss. The forces modulating these events are also subject to the strict interaction between nuclear and mitochondrial (mt) genome. In this context we investigate the evolution of nuclear genes encoding proteins which target the mitochondrion, with a particular attention to genes involved in oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS), one of the most ancient and conserved functions. To examine thoroughly the evolutionary strategies that preserve OXPHOS and coordinate the two cellular genomes, a comparative analysis has been carried out for 78 OXPHOS gene families in several Metazoa (insects, tunicates, fishes and mammals). We demonstrate that the duplication rate of OXPHOS genes increases passing from invertebrates to vertebrates consistently with the total increase in genome size, but all species are prone to negatively select OXPHOS duplicates compared to the general trend of nuclear gene families. These results are consistent with the ‘balance hypothesis’ and, at least in insects, the expression of duplicate genes is low and strongly testis-biased.
Keywords: Mitochondrion; Oxidative phosphorylation; Gene families
Abbreviations: Mt, Mitochondrial; OXPHOS, Oxidative phosphorylation; MCL, Markov cluster; Myr, Million years
Article Outline
- 1. Introduction
- 2. Material and methods
- 3. Results and discussion
- 3.1. Genome-wide analysis of OXPHOS families
- 3.2. Evolution of OXPHOS families
- 3.3. OXPHOS families compared to other nuclear families
- 3.4. OXPHOS complex IV and cytochrome c
- 3.5. Evolution of other nuclear genes
- 3.6. Conclusions
- Acknowledgements
- References
