Home page U.M.R. de GENETIQUE VEGETALE du MOULON Team of Evolutionary genetics: adaptation and redundancy

Team members

Catherine DAMERVAL   Senior researcher CNRS (head) Karine ALIX Assistant professor INA-PG Thierry BALLIAU Technician INRA (proteomics) Philippe BRABANT  Professor INA-PG Martine LE GUILLOUX Technician CNRS Domenica MANICACCI Assistant professor UPS Marie-Thérèse MARCOMBE        Technician INRA Agnès ROUSSELET Technician INRA Maud TENAILLON Junior researcher CNRS Hervé THIELLEMENT Senior researcher INRA

 
Research Topics

Our research investigations aim at depicting the evolutionary mechanisms underlying phenotypic diversity, with a particular interest for genetic redundancy.

Domestication    Karine Alix, Catherine Damerval, Domenica Manicacci, Marie-Thérèse  Marcombe, Agnès Rousselet, Maud Tenaillon, Coll. GQMS, GQF, BMBI Our research activity is devoted to investigate both the forces acting on genome evolution and the genetic mechanisms underlying the adaptative response during maize domestication. The effects of human and natural selection are studied at different levels (i) on a multigene family involved in the kernel starch content determinism; (ii) on the diversity of mobile elements; (3) on tightly-linked loci encoding domestication traits. We are undertaking an association mapping approach to study the correlation between nucleotide diversity of genes either involved in the domestication process or in the future steps of selection and the phenotypic variability of the corresponding traits.

Polyploidy                         Karine Alix, Thierry Balliau, Philippe Brabant, HervéThiellement Coll. GQMF, BMBI   Our studies on polyploidy aim at understanding how the structural and functional stabilization of a polyploid genome occurs and which underlying mechanisms are involved. In this context we study the consequences of polyploidy on the genetic expression and its regulation in Brassica using comparative proteomics to identify which genes and/or metabolic pathways are concerned. This approach will be complemented by transcriptomics experiments in order to define at which level the regulation of these genes operates. Studies of the activation of transposable elements following recent polyploidization events (synthetic allotetraploid oilseed rapes) would allow characterizing the impact of these repeated elements on the structural and functional changes that occur during the stabilization of a polyploid genome.

Floral symmetry      Catherine Damerval, Martine LeGuilloux, Marie-thérèse Marcombe Among the morphological innovations punctuating Angiosperm evolution, floral symmetry appears as a recurrently evolving successful trait. We use an evo-devo approach to examine homology of genes and processes involved in this recurrent evolution, with a special interest in basal eudicots. We study molecular evolution of transcription gene families known to be involved in floral symmetry of the model species Antirrhinum majus in the Papaveraceae. Phylogenetic analyses, expression studies and eventually cross-transformation experiments are used to check the possible role of such genes in evolution of floral symmetry in this taxon.

Recent outcomes

Domestication  
¤   Molecular evolution of the Opaque-2 transcription factor that is expressed in maize endosperm, was investigated as related to its possible role in the domestication process, especially the dramatic change in grain reserve composition. Nucleotide polymorphism is high, even though a classical decrease is observed in cultivated forms as compared to wild-types ((resp. p=0.012 et p=0.017). Different regions of the gene appear to be submitted to different evolutionary constraints. Polymorphism pattern in wild and cultivated forms does not support the hypothesis of a role of the O2 coding region during domestication [4]. The nucleotide diversity of Sh2 gene involved in the biosynthesis starch pathway of maize kernels has been investigated in maize (sample of inbreds and landraces) and in teosintes (ssp. parviglumis, mexicana and huehuetenangensis). Diversity in the coding region of Sh2 is low and bears the footprints of past ancient selection predating domestication. On a distance-based tree, cultivated forms appear intermingled with the ssp. parviglumis (ancestor of the cultivated forms) and mexicana. The latter may have contributed to the actual diversity of maize by recurrent gene flow.
¤   Based on the sequencing of 1095 ESTs in a common panel of 14 maize inbreds, we identified 35 ESTs with zero diversity in maize as potential targets of selection. The subsequent sequencing of these ESTs in a common panel of teosintes (ssp. parviglumis) and landraces coupled with the use of specific neutrality tests incorporating maize past demographic history [12] reveal 8 selected ESTs, among which 4 were selected during domestication and 4 were selected in the subsequent steps of selection. Homologies search in databases reveal the involvement of these EST in regulatory functions, plant development and metabolic pathways and in [5].

Collaborators: INRA Versailles (M-A. GrandBastien), UC Irvine (B. Gaut), Univ. Georgia (Jeff Ross-Ibarra), Univ. Missouri (M. McMullen), IBP (J-L Prioul), INSERM EMI0339  (O. Tenaillon), ESE (F. Austerlitz).

Collaborators: INRA Rennes (A-M Chèvre), ISV (O. Catrice), INRA Versailles (C. Malosse), ANR « Biodiversité » (coord ; M. Aïnouche, Univ. Rennes I), University of Leicester UK (Pat Heslop-Harrison), University of Missouri USA (C. Pirès).

Floral symmetry   

¤   The TCP transcription factor gene family has been defined on shared structural specificities of the Teosinte-branched1, Cycloidea (Cyc) and PCF genes. This gene family appears restricted to plants and is involved in growth and development phenomena. The Cyc gene is one of the major agent of zygomorphy in Antirrhinum majus. In Arabidopsis genome, 24 TCP genes are found, 11 of which are Cyc-like genes. A phylogenetic analysis of Cyc-like genes in Angiosperms shows (i) homoplasy for the presence of the R domain, (ii) independendant duplication/loss in various botanical families, leading to a large diversity among these genes [14].

Collaborators: UMR 7138 (M. Jager, M. Manuel – J. Deutsch), ESE (S. Siljak-Yakovlev, S. Nadot), IBP (C. Charon, M. Dron).

Teaching

Institution of higher education and research in life science of Paris (INA P-G)

First year.

            Population and Quantitative genetics

            Genetic Resources and Plant Breeding  

            « From domestication to transgenesis »: Impact of human selection on plants

            « Biotechnologies and Agriculture »

Second year.

            « Plants and Environmental constraints»

Third year.

Plant Production Engineering

            Plant Breeding: methods, goals, seed industry

            Plant Biotechnologies

            Molecular Evolution

            Plant Breeding and Genetics

Management, Innovations and Performances

            Biotechnologies and Health

University of Paris XI (Orsay)
Graduation
           Statistics
           Population and Quantitative genetics
Master
           Biostatistics
           Evolutionary Genetics

Team past members

Warren ALBERTIN (PhD student 2002-2005)
Stéphanie BARRAUD (assistant engineer 2001-2004)
Marie FOURMANN (Biogemma researcher 2001-2003)
Valérie MECHIN (postdoc 2001-2003 ; junior researcher at INRA since 2003)
Anne-Laure RAQUIN (PhD student 2001-2005)

Selected publications

[1] Albertin W., Brabant P., Catrice O., Eber F., Jenczewski E., Chèvre A.-M. , and Thiellement H. (2005). Autopolyploidy in cabbage (Brassica oleracea L.) does not alter significantly the proteome of green tissues. Proteomics 5, 2131-2139.

[2] Alix K., Ryder C.D., Moore J., King G.J., and Heslop-Harrison J.S. (2005). The genomic organization of retrotransposons in Brassica oleracea. Plant Mol. Biol. 59: 839-851.

[3] Chardon F.and Damerval C. (2005). Phylogenomic analysis of the PEBP gene family in Cereals. J. Mol. Evol. 61: 579-590.

[4] Henry, A.-M., Manicacci, D., Falque, M.,  and Damerval, C. (2005). Molecular evolution of the Opaque-2 gene in Zea mays L. J. Mol. Evol. 61: 551-558.

[5] Masanori Y., Tenaillon M.I., Vroh Bi I., Schroeder S.G., Sanchez-Villeda H., Doebley J.F., Gaut B.S., and McMullen M. (2005). A large-scale screen for artificial selection in maize identifies candidate agronomic loci for domestication and crop improvement. Plant Cell 17:2859-2872.
[6] Thevenot C., Simond-Cote E., Reyss A., Manicacci D., Trouverie J., Le Guilloux M., Ginhoux V., Sidicina F., and Prioul JL. (2005). QTLs for enzyme activities and soluble carbohydrates involved in starch accumulation during grain filling in maize. J. Exp.Bot. 56:945-958.

[7] Thiellement H., Méchin V., Damerval C., and Zivy M. (Eds.) (2005). Plant Proteomics : Methods and Protocols. Humana Press, Totowa, New Jersey, U.S.A. (in press)
[8] Alix K. and Heslop-Harrison J.S. (2004). The diversity of retroelements in diploid and allotetraploid Brassica species. Plant Mol. Biol. 54: 895-909.

[9] Guillet-Claude C., Birolleau-Touchard C., Manicacci D., Rogowsky P. M., Rigau J., Murigneux A., Martinant J.-P., and Barrière Y. (2004). Nucleotide diversity of the ZmPox3 maize peroxidase gene : relationships between a MITE insertion in exon 2 and variation in forage maize digestibility. BMC Genet. 5, 19.

[10] Guillet-Claude C., Birolleau-Touchard C., Manicacci D., Fourmann M., Barraud S., Carret V., Martinant J.-P., and Barrière Y.(2004). Genetic diversity associated with variation in silage corn digestibility for three O-methyl transferase genes involved in lignin biosynthesis. Theor. Appl. Genet.  110: 126-135.

[11] Méchin V., Balliau T., Château-Joubert S., Davanture M., Langella O., Négroni L., Prioul J.-L., Thévenot C., Zivy M., and Damerval C. (2004). A two dimensional proteome map of maize endosperm. Phytochemistry, 65, 1609-1618.

[12] Tenaillon M.I., U’Ren J., Tenaillon O., and Gaut B.S. (2004) Selection versus demography : a multilocus investigation of the domestication process in maize. Mol Biol Evol 21(7): 1214-1225.
[13] Thiellement H. and Zivy M. (2003) La protéomique des plantes. Biofutur 234 : 38-40.
[14] Damerval C. and Manuel M. (2003) Independent evolution of Cycloidea-like sequences in several Angiosperm taxa. C. R. Palevol 2: 241-250.

[15] Tenaillon M. I., Sawkins M. C., Anderson L. K., Stack S. M., Doebley   J., and Gaut B. S. (2002) . Patterns of diversity and recombination along chromosome 1 of maize (Zea mays ssp. mays L.). Genetics     162: 1401-1413.