Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/2445/33552
Title: The UlaG protein familly defines novel structural and functional motifs grafted on an ancient RNase fold
Author: Fernández Pérez, Francisco José
Garces, Fernando
López-Estepa, Miguel
Aguilar Piera, Juan
Baldomà Llavinés, Laura
Coll, Miquel
Badía Palacín, Josefa
Vega Fernández, Maria Cristina
Keywords: Bacteris
Enzims
Filogènia
Bacteria
Enzymes
Phylogeny
Evolució molecular
Molecular evolution
Ribonucleases
Genètica bacteriana
Bacterial genetics
Seqüència d'aminoàcids
Amino acid sequence
Issue Date: 26-Sep-2011
Publisher: BioMed Central
Abstract: Background: Bacterial populations are highly successful at colonizing new habitats and adapting to changing environmental conditions, partly due to their capacity to evolve novel virulence and metabolic pathways in response to stress conditions and to shuffle them by horizontal gene transfer (HGT). A common theme in the evolution of new functions consists of gene duplication followed by functional divergence. UlaG, a unique manganese-dependent metallo-b-lactamase (MBL) enzyme involved in L-ascorbate metabolism by commensal and symbiotic enterobacteria, provides a model for the study of the emergence of new catalytic activities from the modification of an ancient fold. Furthermore, UlaG is the founding member of the so-called UlaG-like (UlaGL) protein family, a recently established and poorly characterized family comprising divalent (and perhaps trivalent)metal-binding MBLs that catalyze transformations on phosphorylated sugars and nucleotides. Results: Here we combined protein structure-guided and sequence-only molecular phylogenetic analyses to dissect the molecular evolution of UlaG and to study its phylogenomic distribution, its relatedness with present-day UlaGL protein sequences and functional conservation. Phylogenetic analyses indicate that UlaGL sequences are present in Bacteria and Archaea, with bona fide orthologs found mainly in mammalian and plant-associated Gramnegative and Gram-positive bacteria. The incongruence between the UlaGL tree and known species trees indicates exchange by HGT and suggests that the UlaGL-encoding genes provided a growth advantage under changing conditions. Our search for more distantly related protein sequences aided by structural homology has uncovered that UlaGL sequences have a common evolutionary origin with present-day RNA processing and metabolizing MBL enzymes widespread in Bacteria, Archaea, and Eukarya. This observation suggests an ancient origin for the UlaGL family within the broader trunk of the MBL superfamily by duplication, neofunctionalization and fixation. Conclusions: Our results suggest that the forerunner of UlaG was present as an RNA metabolizing enzyme in the last common ancestor, and that the modern descendants of that ancestral gene have a wide phylogenetic distribution and functional roles. We propose that the UlaGL family evolved new metabolic roles among bacterial and possibly archeal phyla in the setting of a close association with metazoans, such as in the mammalian gastrointestinal tract or in animal and plant pathogens, as well as in environmental settings. Accordingly, the major evolutionary forces shaping the UlaGL family include vertical inheritance and lineage-specific duplication and acquisition of novel metabolic functions, followed by HGT and numerous lineage-specific gene loss events.
Note: Reproducció del document publicat a: http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-11-273
It is part of: Bmc Evolutionary Biology, 2011, vol. 11, num. 273
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/2445/33552
Related resource: http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2148-11-273
ISSN: 1471-2148
Appears in Collections:Articles publicats en revistes (Bioquímica i Biomedicina Molecular)

Files in This Item:
File Description SizeFormat 
598959.pdf19.39 MBAdobe PDFView/Open


This item is licensed under a Creative Commons License Creative Commons