Signatures of Divergence, Invasiveness, and Terrestrialization Revealed by Four Apple Snail Genomes

The family Ampullariidae includes both aquatic and amphibious apple snails. They are an emerging model for evolutionary studies due to the high diversity, ancient history, and wide geographical distribution. Insight into drivers of ampullariid evolution is hampered, however, by the lack of genomic r...

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Published inMolecular biology and evolution Vol. 36; no. 7; pp. 1507 - 1520
Main Authors Sun, Jin, Mu, Huawei, Ip, Jack C H, Li, Runsheng, Xu, Ting, Accorsi, Alice, Sánchez Alvarado, Alejandro, Ross, Eric, Lan, Yi, Sun, Yanan, Castro-Vazquez, Alfredo, Vega, Israel A, Heras, Horacio, Ituarte, Santiago, Van Bocxlaer, Bert, Hayes, Kenneth A, Cowie, Robert H, Zhao, Zhongying, Zhang, Yu, Qian, Pei-Yuan, Qiu, Jian-Wen
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States Oxford University Press (OUP) 01.07.2019
Oxford University Press
Subjects
Adaptation, Biological
Animal biology
Animal genetics
Animals
Discoveries
Genes, Homeobox
Genetics
Genome
Introduced Species
Invertebrate Zoology
Karyotype
Life Sciences
Multigene Family
Oviposition
Phylogeny
Snails - genetics
gastropod
genomics
interchromosome rearrangement
Hox genes
gene duplication
mollusc
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Summary:The family Ampullariidae includes both aquatic and amphibious apple snails. They are an emerging model for evolutionary studies due to the high diversity, ancient history, and wide geographical distribution. Insight into drivers of ampullariid evolution is hampered, however, by the lack of genomic resources. Here, we report the genomes of four ampullariids spanning the Old World (Lanistes nyassanus) and New World (Pomacea canaliculata, P. maculata, and Marisa cornuarietis) clades. The ampullariid genomes have conserved ancient bilaterial karyotype features and a novel Hox gene cluster rearrangement, making them valuable in comparative genomic studies. They have expanded gene families related to environmental sensing and cellulose digestion, which may have facilitated some ampullarids to become notorious invasive pests. In the amphibious Pomacea, novel acquisition of an egg neurotoxin and a protein for making the calcareous eggshell may have been key adaptations enabling their transition from underwater to terrestrial egg deposition.
Bibliography:These authors contributed equally to this work.
ISSN:0737-4038
1537-1719
DOI:10.1093/molbev/msz084