Journal
PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Volume 99, Issue 4, Pages 2082-2087Publisher
NATL ACAD SCIENCES
DOI: 10.1073/pnas.261699498
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Cyanobacteria are the only prokaryotes known thus far possessing regulation of physiological functions with approximate daily periodicity, or circadian rhythms, that are controlled by a cluster of three genes, kaiA, kaiB, and kaiC. Here we demonstrate considerably higher genetic polymorphism and extremely rapid evolution of the kaiABC gene family in a filamentous cyanobacterium, Nostoc linckia, permanently exposed to the acute natural environmental stress in the two microsite evolutionary models known as Evolution Canyons, I (Mount Carmel) and 11 (Upper Galilee) in Israel. The family consists of five distinct subfamilies (kail-kaiV) comprising at least 20 functional genes and pseudogenes. The obtained data suggest that the duplications of kai genes have adaptive significance, and some of them are evolutionarily quite recent (approximate to80,000 years ago). The observed patterns of within- and between-subfamily polymorphisms indicate that positive diversifying, balancing, and purifying selections are the principal driving forces of the kai gene family's evolution.
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