De Novo ORFs in Drosophila Are Important to Organismal Fitness and Evolved Rapidly from Previously Non-coding Sequences
Figure 3
De novo genes exhibit male-biased and germline-dependent expression.
We compared the expression of six D. melanogaster de novo genes (CG31406, CG33235, CG31909, CG34434, CG32582, and CG32690) in a variety of tissues dissected from D. melanogaster using qRT-PCR. Expression of each gene was measured using Actin as a reference (similar results were obtained using GPDH as the control gene, data not shown). Expression results are shown relative to the testes sample, and was highest in the testes (testes and tombola columns were both testes samples), and was reduced in testes of males lacking a gremline (sons-of-tudor, light green). In the case of CG31406, expression was reduced in flies carrying a meiotic arrest mutation (tombola, red), suggesting it may be functioning in the post-meiotic germline. Finally, we found that male larvae express all six genes at a higher level than female larvae (pink compared to light blue).