Project name: Yeast Lachancea Kluyveri uses tripartite mechanism for haploid specific gene repression [RNA-seq]

Description: Over evolutionary timescales, the logic and pattern of cell-type specific gene expression can remain constant, yet the molecular mechanisms underlying such regulation can drift between alternative forms. Here, we document a new, especially clear example of this principle in the regulation of the haploid-specific genes across a wide group of fungal species. For most species, transcription of these genes is repressed in the a/ a cell type by a heterodimer of two homeodomain proteins, Mata1 and Mata2. We show that in the species Lachancea kluveri, repression of one haploid-specific gene (GPA1) requires, in addition to Mata1 and Mata2, a third regulatory protein, Mcm1. Model building, based on x-ray crystal structures of the three proteins, rationalizes the requirement for all three proteins: no single pair of the proteins is optimally arranged and we show that no single pair can bring about repression. Although the three-part solution is used to regulate GPA1 in L. kluveri, the other haploid specific genes in this species are regulated by the more conventional two-protein mechanism. This case study exemplifies the idea that the energy of DNA binding can be “shared out” in different ways and can result is different DNA-binding solutions across different genes—while maintaining the same pattern of gene expression.Overall design: Genome-wide transcriptional profiling of L.kluyveri a cell, alpha cell, and a/cell by RNAseq, to determine haploid specific gene expression in this yeast species. Haploid specific genes are genes expressed in both haploid cell types (a cell and alpha cell) but not the diploid a/alpha cell

Data type: Transcriptome or Gene expression

Sample scope: Multiisolate

Relevance: Other

Last updated: 2022-12-29