Human-chimpanzee alignment: Ortholog Exponentials and Paralog Power Laws

TL;DR

This paper analyzes the length distributions of conserved genomic sequences between humans and chimpanzees, revealing exponential distributions for orthologs and algebraic for paralogs, providing insights into evolutionary relationships.

Contribution

It introduces a decomposition of conserved sequences into orthologous and paralogous components based on their length distributions.

Findings

Exponential length distribution for orthologous sequences

Algebraic length distribution for paralogous sequences

Distinct distribution patterns reflect evolutionary relationships

Abstract

Genomic subsequences conserved between closely related species such as human and chimpanzee exhibit an exponential length distribution, in contrast to the algebraic length distribution observed for sequences shared between distantly related genomes. We find that the former exponential can be further decomposed into an exponential component primarily composed of orthologous sequences, and a truncated algebraic component primarily composed of paralogous sequences.