Lineage-specific transposons drove massive gene expression recruitments during the evolution of pregnancy in mammals

TL;DR

This study reveals that lineage-specific transposons significantly contributed to the rapid gene expression changes in the uterus, facilitating the evolution of pregnancy in mammals through genomic and regulatory reorganization.

Contribution

It uncovers the role of transposons in driving gene expression recruitment during mammalian pregnancy evolution, highlighting a mechanism for evolutionary innovation.

Findings

Gene expression in the uterus evolves slowly but with rapid bursts during pregnancy evolution.

Many genes involved in pregnancy are recruited via transposon-derived regulatory elements.

Transposon activity correlates with key evolutionary transitions in mammalian reproductive biology.

Abstract

A major challenge in biology is explaining how novel characters originate, however, the molecular mechanisms that underlie the emergence of evolutionary innovations are unclear. Here we show that while gene expression in the uterus evolves at a slow and relatively constant rate, it has been punctuated by periods of rapid change associated with the recruitment of thousands of genes into uterine expression during the evolution of pregnancy in mammals. We found that numerous genes and signaling pathways essential for the establishment of pregnancy and maternal-fetal communication evolved uterine expression in mammals. Remarkably the majority of genes recruited into endometrial expression have cis-regulatory elements derived from lineage-specific transposons, suggesting that that bursts of transposition facilitate adaptation and speciation through genomic and regulatory reorganization.