Journal
JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL BOTANY
Volume 69, Issue 8, Pages 1967-1980Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/jxb/ery029
Keywords
Biochemical pathway; C-4 photosynthesis; copy number variation; dosage effect; gene duplication; grasses; low-coverage sequencing
Categories
Funding
- Brazilian Research Council (CNPq) [201873/2014-1]
- NERC [NE/M00208X/1, R8/H10/56]
- Royal Society [RG130448]
- Royal Society University Research Fellowship [URF120119]
- UK Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) Biomolecular Analysis Facility at the University of Sheffield
- MRC [MR/K001744/1]
- BBSRC [BB/J004243/1]
- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council [BBS/E/D/20310000] Funding Source: researchfish
- Medical Research Council [MR/K001744/1] Funding Source: researchfish
- Natural Environment Research Council [NBAF010002, NE/M00208X/1] Funding Source: researchfish
- BBSRC [BBS/E/D/20310000] Funding Source: UKRI
- NERC [NBAF010002] Funding Source: UKRI
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The importance of gene duplication for evolutionary diversification has been mainly discussed in terms of genetic redundancy allowing neofunctionalization. In the case of C-4 photosynthesis, which evolved via the co- option of multiple enzymes to boost carbon fixation in tropical conditions, the importance of genetic redundancy has not been consistently supported by genomic studies. Here, we test for a different role for gene duplication in the early evolution of C-4 photosynthesis, via dosage effects creating rapid step changes in expression levels. Using genome- wide data for accessions of the grass genus Alloteropsis that recently diversified into different photosynthetic types, we estimate gene copy numbers and demonstrate that recurrent duplications in two important families of C-4 genes coincided with increases in transcript abundance along the phylogeny, in some cases via a pure dosage effect. While increased gene copy number during the initial emergence of C-4 photosynthesis probably offered a rapid route to enhanced expression, we also find losses of duplicates following the acquisition of genes encoding better- suited isoforms. The dosage effect of gene duplication might therefore act as a transient process during the evolution of a C-4 biochemistry, rendered obsolete by the fixation of regulatory mutations increasing expression levels.
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