Peacemaking: Our Essential Work in the Last Days

This address was given at the J. Reuben Clark Law Society Conference at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, on February 16, 2007

The Constrained Maximal Expression Level Owing to Haploidy Shapes Gene Content on the Mammalian X Chromosome.

X chromosomes are unusual in many regards, not least of which is their nonrandom gene content. The causes of this bias are commonly discussed in the context of sexual antagonism and the avoidance of activity in the male germline. Here, we examine the notion that, at least in some taxa, functionally biased gene content may more profoundly be shaped by limits imposed on gene expression owing to haploid expression of the X chromosome. Notably, if the X, as in primates, is transcribed at rates comparable to the ancestral rate (per promoter) prior to the X chromosome formation, then the X is not a tolerable environment for genes with very high maximal net levels of expression, owing to transcriptional traffic jams. We test this hypothesis using The Encyclopedia of DNA Elements (ENCODE) and data from the Functional Annotation of the Mammalian Genome (FANTOM5) project. As predicted, the maximal expression of human X-linked genes is much lower than that of genes on autosomes: on average, maximal expression is three times lower on the X chromosome than on autosomes. Similarly, autosome-to-X retroposition events are associated with lower maximal expression of retrogenes on the X than seen for X-to-autosome retrogenes on autosomes. Also as expected, X-linked genes have a lesser degree of increase in gene expression than autosomal ones (compared to the human/Chimpanzee common ancestor) if highly expressed, but not if lowly expressed. The traffic jam model also explains the known lower breadth of expression for genes on the X (and the Z of birds), as genes with broad expression are, on average, those with high maximal expression. As then further predicted, highly expressed tissue-specific genes are also rare on the X and broadly expressed genes on the X tend to be lowly expressed, both indicating that the trend is shaped by the maximal expression level not the breadth of expression per se. Importantly, a limit to the maximal expression level explains biased tissue of expression profiles of X-linked genes. Tissues whose tissue-specific genes are very highly expressed (e.g., secretory tissues, tissues abundant in structural proteins) are also tissues in which gene expression is relatively rare on the X chromosome. These trends cannot be fully accounted for in terms of alternative models of biased expression. In conclusion, the notion that it is hard for genes on the Therian X to be highly expressed, owing to transcriptional traffic jams, provides a simple yet robustly supported rationale of many peculiar features of X's gene content, gene expression, and evolution

Peacemaking: Our Essential Work in the Last Days

This address was given at the J. Reuben Clark Law Society Conference at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, on February 16, 2007

ACCN2839_001_011

Typed transcript from diaries of Chieko N. Okazaki, entries from July of 1994, covering a trip to Europe: Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Belgium, France. She travelled with friends, John and Carol Lee _______; John had conferences at Bielefeld, Germany

ACCN2839_001_017

Typed transcript from diaries of Chieko N. Okazaki: entries from January to April 2, 200

ACCN2839_001_016

Diary of Chieko N. Okazaki covering a trip to Amsterdam and The Hague, Netherlands, June 23 to July 2, 2004

ACCN2839_001_010

Typed transcript from diaries of Chieko N. Okazaki, entries from 9 October 1992 to 5 November 1992, which includes a trip to Korea and Japan in her capacity as First Counselor of the Relief Society General Presidency

ACCN2839_001_003

Diary of Chieko N. Okazaki with entries dated July 26 to August 19, 2007. Title on cover: "Prayer and gratitude journal." It covers a trip to Hawaii for a conference at the Brigham Young University campus at Laie on Oahu, and an August trip to Vail, Colorado

ACCN2839_001_008

Typed outline of events and activities of Chieko N. Okazaki in 1980 (single page), possibly transcripts from her diaries

ACCN2839_001_013

Typed transcript from diaries of Chieko N. Okazaki, entries from January 1998 (a trip to Alaska) and April-May 1998 (trip to London, England)