The genome of the choanoflagellate Monosiga brevicollis and the origin of metazoans

By N. King, M. J. Westbrook, S. L. Young, A. Kuo, M. Abedin, Jarrod Chapman, Stephen R. Fairclough, U. Hellsten, Yoh Isogai, Ivica Letunic and 26 more. 2008

1,101 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Choanoflagellates are the closest known relatives of metazoans. To discover potential molecular mechanisms underlying the evolution of metazoan multicellularity, we sequenced and analysed the genome of the unicellular choanoflagellate Monosiga brevicollis. The genome contains approximately 9,200 intron-rich genes, including a number that encode cell adhesion and signalling protein domains that are otherwise restricted to metazoans. Here we show that the physical linkages among protein domains often differ between M. brevicollis and metazoans, suggesting that abundant domain shuffling followed the separation of the choanoflagellate and metazoan lineages. The completion of the M. brevicollis genome allows us to reconstruct with increasing resolution the genomic changes that accompanied the origin of metazoans.

Subfields: Ecology, Molecular Biology

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Citations in the corpus

Engineering Customized Cell Sensing and Response Behaviors Using Synthetic Notch Receptors (2016, background): “…metazoan and pre-metazoan species shows that full-length Notch (with delta-binding domain) is only found in metazoans but that proto- Notch genes that lack the delta-binding domain are found in pre-metazoans such as choanoflagellates and capsaspora (Gazave et al., 2009; King et al., 2008).”
The evolution of cell types in animals: emerging principles from molecular studies (2008, background): “3d ) and possessed, and most likely expressed, at least all the genes and functions shared between the recently sequenced choanoflagellate Monosiga brevicollis”
Mechanisms and functions of Hedgehog signalling across the metazoa (2011, background): “, in the N-terminal extracellular domain of a large transmembrane protei”
The Amphimedon queenslandica genome and the evolution of animal complexity (2010, positive): “For example, Monosiga encodes proteins with collagen triple helix repeats and other genes with fibrillar collagen C-terminal domains, but these domains only appear together in metazoans.(30,31) Thrombospondin domain architectures are found in Amphimedon, however agrin, netrin, and perlecan appear to”
The Sox Family of Transcription Factors: Versatile Regulators of Stem and Progenitor Cell Fate (2013, neutral): “In addition, two Sox-like genes have been identified in the unicellular choanoflagellateMonosiga brevicollis, suggesting that the origin of Sox proteins predates multicellularity or possibly marks the transition of unicellular to multicellular organisms (Guth and Wegner, 2008; King et al., 2008).”
Rethinking the marine carbon cycle: Factoring in the multifarious lifestyles of microbes (2015, neutral): “standing the origins of multicellularity (137, 138),”
TCF/LEFs and Wnt signaling in the nucleus. (2012, background): “Leaving this consideration aside, examination of predicted proteomes suggests that Wnts, b-catenin, and TCF/ LEFs are metazoan inventions, because they are absent in Choanoflagellates (a single-cell eukaryote) and present in Sponges (King et al. 2008; Adamska et al. 2010; Srivastava et al. 2010).”
The Multiple Origins of Complex Multicellularity (2011, background): “Indeed, basic components of these systems occur in choanoflagellates (King et al. 2008) and even deeper in the eukaryotic tree.”
Phylogenomics revives traditional views on deep animal relationships. (2009, neutral): “The specialized collar apparatus of sponge choanocytes has often been assumed to be an ancient feature shared with choanoflagellates, based on phenotypic similarity [16].”