ORCID Profile
0000-0002-4615-8917
Current Organisations
AgResearch Ltd
,
University of Otago
,
AgResearch Invermay
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Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 06-09-2023
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 18-08-2020
DOI: 10.1038/S41586-020-2661-6
Abstract: An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 05-08-2020
DOI: 10.1038/S41586-020-2561-9
Abstract: The tuatara ( Sphenodon punctatus )—the only living member of the reptilian order Rhynchocephalia (Sphenodontia), once widespread across Gondwana 1,2 —is an iconic species that is endemic to New Zealand 2,3 . A key link to the now-extinct stem reptiles (from which dinosaurs, modern reptiles, birds and mammals evolved), the tuatara provides key insights into the ancestral amniotes 2,4 . Here we analyse the genome of the tuatara, which—at approximately 5 Gb—is among the largest of the vertebrate genomes yet assembled. Our analyses of this genome, along with comparisons with other vertebrate genomes, reinforce the uniqueness of the tuatara. Phylogenetic analyses indicate that the tuatara lineage erged from that of snakes and lizards around 250 million years ago. This lineage also shows moderate rates of molecular evolution, with instances of punctuated evolution. Our genome sequence analysis identifies expansions of proteins, non-protein-coding RNA families and repeat elements, the latter of which show an amalgam of reptilian and mammalian features. The sequencing of the tuatara genome provides a valuable resource for deep comparative analyses of tetrapods, as well as for tuatara biology and conservation. Our study also provides important insights into both the technical challenges and the cultural obligations that are associated with genome sequencing.
Publisher: Wiley
Date: 18-05-2020
DOI: 10.1111/AGE.12953
Publisher: Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Date: 16-04-2014
Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
Date: 11-08-2023
Abstract: Using DNA methylation profiles ( n = 15,456) from 348 mammalian species, we constructed phyloepigenetic trees that bear marked similarities to traditional phylogenetic ones. Using unsupervised clustering across all s les, we identified 55 distinct cytosine modules, of which 30 are related to traits such as maximum life span, adult weight, age, sex, and human mortality risk. Maximum life span is associated with methylation levels in HOXL subclass homeobox genes and developmental processes and is potentially regulated by pluripotency transcription factors. The methylation state of some modules responds to perturbations such as caloric restriction, ablation of growth hormone receptors, consumption of high-fat diets, and expression of Yamanaka factors. This study reveals an intertwined evolution of the genome and epigenome that mediates the biological characteristics and traits of different mammalian species.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 28-02-2018
DOI: 10.1038/S41467-017-02809-1
Abstract: Domestication fundamentally reshaped animal morphology, physiology and behaviour, offering the opportunity to investigate the molecular processes driving evolutionary change. Here we assess sheep domestication and artificial selection by comparing genome sequence from 43 modern breeds ( Ovis aries ) and their Asian mouflon ancestor ( O. orientalis ) to identify selection sweeps. Next, we provide a comparative functional annotation of the sheep genome, validated using experimental ChIP-Seq of sheep tissue. Using these annotations, we evaluate the impact of selection and domestication on regulatory sequences and find that sweeps are significantly enriched for protein coding genes, proximal regulatory elements of genes and genome features associated with active transcription. Finally, we find in idual sites displaying strong allele frequency ergence are enriched for the same regulatory features. Our data demonstrate that remodelling of gene expression is likely to have been one of the evolutionary forces that drove phenotypic ersification of this common livestock species.
Publisher: MDPI AG
Date: 12-07-2021
DOI: 10.3390/F12070904
Abstract: The recovery of genealogy in both natural and captive populations is critical for any decision in the management of genetic resources. It allows for the estimation of genetic parameters such as heritability and genetic correlations, as well as defining an optimal mating design that maintains a large effective population size. We utilised “genotyping-by-sequencing” (GBS) in combination with bioinformatics tools developed specifically for GBS data to recover genetic relatedness, with a focus on parent-offspring relationships in a Eucalyptus nitens breeding population as well as recognition of in iduals representing other Eucalyptus species and putative hybrids. We found a clear advantage on using tools specifically designed for data of highly variable sequencing quality when recovering genetic relatedness. The parent-offspring relatedness showed a significant response to data filtering from 0.05 to 0.3 when the standard approach (G1) was used, while it oscillated around 0.4 when the specifically designed method (G5) was implemented. Additionally, comparisons with commonly used tools demonstrated vulnerability of the relatedness estimates to incorrect imputation of missing data when shallow sequencing information and genetically distant in iduals are present in the population. In turn, these biased imputed genotypes negatively affected the estimation of genetic relatedness between parents and offspring. Careful filtering for both genetic outliers and shallowly sequenced markers led to improvements in estimations of genetic relatedness. Alternatively, a method that avoided missing data imputation and took sequence depth into consideration improved the accuracy of parent-offspring relationship coefficients where sequencing data quality was highly variable.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 10-08-2023
DOI: 10.1038/S43587-023-00462-6
Abstract: Aging, often considered a result of random cellular damage, can be accurately estimated using DNA methylation profiles, the foundation of pan-tissue epigenetic clocks. Here, we demonstrate the development of universal pan-mammalian clocks, using 11,754 methylation arrays from our Mammalian Methylation Consortium, which encompass 59 tissue types across 185 mammalian species. These predictive models estimate mammalian tissue age with high accuracy ( r 0.96). Age deviations correlate with human mortality risk, mouse somatotropic axis mutations and caloric restriction. We identified specific cytosines with methylation levels that change with age across numerous species. These sites, highly enriched in polycomb repressive complex 2-binding locations, are near genes implicated in mammalian development, cancer, obesity and longevity. Our findings offer new evidence suggesting that aging is evolutionarily conserved and intertwined with developmental processes across all mammals.
Location: United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland
Start Date: 2023
End Date: 2028
Funder: Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment
View Funded Activity