Abstract
The larval cuticle protein genes (Lcps) represent a multigene family located at the right arm of the metacentric autosome 2 (2R) inDrosophila melanogaster. Due to a chromosome fusion theLcp locus ofDrosophila miranda is situated on a pair of secondary sex chromosomes, theX2 andneo-Y chromosome. Comparing the DNA sequences fromD. miranda andD. melanogaster organization and the gene arrangement ofLcp1-Lcp4 are similar, although the intergene distances vary considerably. The greatest difference betweenLcp1 andLcp2 is due to the occurrence of a pseudogene inD. melanogaster which is not present inD. miranda. Thus the cluster of the fourLcp genes existed already before the separation of themelanogaster andobscura group. Intraspecific homogenizations of different cluster units must have occurred repeatedly between theLcp1/Lcp2 andLcp3/Lcp4 sequence types. The most obvious example is exon 2 of theLcp3 gene inD. miranda, which has been substituted by the corresponding section of theLcp4 gene rather recently. The homogenization must have occurred before the translocation which generated theneo-Y chromosome.Lcp3 ofD. melanogaster has therefore no orthologous partner inD. miranda. Rearrangements in the promoter regions of theD. miranda Lcp genes have generated new, potentially functional CAAT-box motifs. Since three of theLcp alleles on theneo-Y are not expressed andLcp3 is expressed only at a reduced level, it is suggestive to speculate that the rearrangements might be involved ascis-regulatory elements in the up-regulation of theX2-chromosomalLcp alleles, inDrosophila an essential process for dosage compensation. TheLcp genes on theneo-Y chromosome have accumulated more base substitutions than the corresponding alleles on theX2.
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Steinemann, M., Steinemann, S. & Pinsker, W. Evolution of the larval cuticle proteins coded by the secondary sex chromosome pair:X2 andneo-Y ofDrosophila miranda: I. Comparison at the DNA sequence level. J Mol Evol 43, 405–412 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02339014
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02339014