Adaptive Evolution of Multicolored Fluorescent Proteins in Reef-Building Corals |
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Authors: | Steven F Field Maria Y Bulina Ilya V Kelmanson Joseph P Bielawski Mikhail V Matz |
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Institution: | (1) Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience, University of Florida, 9505 Ocean Shore Boulevard, St. Augustine, FL 32080, USA;(2) Shemyakin-Ovchinnikov Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry, Miklukho-Maklaya, 16/10, Moscow, Russia;(3) Department of Biology, Dalhousie University, 1355 Oxford Street, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada;(4) Department of Molecular Genetics and Microbiology, University of Florida, 1600 S.W. Archer Road, Gainesville, FL 32610, USA |
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Abstract: | Here we investigate the evolutionary scenarios that led to the appearance of fluorescent color diversity in reef-building
corals. We show that the mutations that have been responsible for the generation of new cyan and red phenotypes from the ancestral
green were fixed with the help of positive natural selection. This fact strongly suggests that the color diversity is a product
of adaptive evolution. An unexpected finding was a set of residues arranged as an intermolecular binding interface, which
was also identified as a target of positive selection but is nevertheless not related to color diversification. We hypothesize
that multicolored fluorescent proteins evolved as part of a mechanism regulating the relationships between the coral and its
algal endosymbionts (zooxanthellae). We envision that the effect of the proteins’ fluorescence on algal physiology may be
achieved not only through photosynthesis modulation, but also through regulatory photosensors analogous to phytochromes and
cryptochromes of higher plants. Such a regulation would require relatively subtle, but spectrally precise, modifications of
the light field. Evolution of such a mechanism would explain both the adaptive diversification of colors and the coevolutionary
chase at the putative algae-protein binding interface in coral fluorescent proteins.
Electronic Supplementary Material Electronic Supplementary material is available for this article at
and accessible for authorised users.
Reviewing Editor: Dr. Rasmus Neilsen] |
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Keywords: | Green fluorescent protein Fluorescence Color evolution Positive selection Symbiosis |
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