Genetic Variation and De Novo Mutations in the Parthenogenetic Caucasian Rock Lizard Darevskia unisexualis

Unisexual all-female lizards of the genus Darevskia that are well adapted to various habitats are known to reproduce normally by true parthenogenesis. Although they consist of unisexual lineages and lack effective genetic recombination, they are characterized by some level of genetic polymorphism. To reveal the mutational contribution to overall genetic variability, the most straightforward and conclusive way is the direct detection of mutation events in pedigree genotyping. Earlier we selected from genomic library of D. unisexualis two polymorphic microsatellite containg loci Du281 and Du215. In this study, these two loci were analyzed to detect possible de novo mutations in 168 parthenogenetic offspring of 49 D. unisexualis mothers and in 147 offspring of 50 D. armeniaca mothers . No mutant alleles were detected in D. armeniaca offspring at both loci, and in D. unisexualis offspring at the Du215 locus. There were a total of seven mutational events in the germ lines of four of the 49 D. unisexualis mothers at the Du281 locus, yielding the mutation rate of 0.1428 events per germ line tissue. Sequencing of the mutant alleles has shown that most mutations occur via deletion or insertion of single microsatellite repeat being identical in all offspring of the family. This indicates that such mutations emerge at the early stages of embryogenesis. In this study we characterized single highly unstable (GATA)n containing locus in parthenogenetic lizard species D. unisexualis. Besides, we characterized various types of mutant alleles of this locus found in the D. unisexualis offspring of the first generation. Our data has shown that microsatellite mutations at highly unstable loci can make a significant contribution to population variability of parthenogenetic lizards

Retrato de Piazzolla. Reworkings of the music of Astor Piazzolla

Amor Quintet: Gabriele Faja, piano. Anne-Marie Curran, violin. Nikolai Ryskov, accordion. Sam Ryan, double bass. Milton Mermikides, guitar

Sequences hybridizing to mRNA, oligo(dT) and dsRNA from pre-mRNA are contiguous in the cloned mouse DNA fragments.

Fragments from the DNA of mouse embryos produced by restriction endonucleases HindIII were cloned in pBR322 plasmid and examined for the ability to hybridize in situ with [32P] labeled cDNA synthesized from the polysomal poly(A)+mRNA template. Several of the selected clones were examined for the presence of specific sequences inside the cloned mouse DNA fragments by the blotting procedure of southern [1]. The data obtained indicate that the majority of the cloned mouse DNA fragments contained sequences hybridizing with cDNA, oligo(dT) and double-stranded regions from pre-mRNA. The results of hybridization experiments and double digestion with HindIII+HaeIII endonucleases provide evidence that these sequences could be contiguous in the given restriction DNA fragments