Distribution, Diversity, and Long-Term Retention of Grass Short Interspersed Nuclear Elements (SINEs)

Instances of highly conserved plant short interspersed nuclear element (SINE) families and their enrichment near genes have been well documented, but little is known about the general patterns of such conservation and enrichment and underlying mechanisms. Here, we perform a comprehensive investigation of the structure, distribution, and evolution of SINEs in the grass family by analyzing 14 grass and 5 other flowering plant genomes using comparative genomics methods. We identify 61 SINE families composed of 29,572 copies, in which 46 families are first described. We find that comparing with other grass TEs, grass SINEs show much higher level of conservation in terms of genomic retention: The origin of at least 26% families can be traced to early grass diversification and these families are among most abundant SINE families in 86% species. We find that these families show much higher level of enrichment near protein coding genes than families of relatively recent origin (51%:28%), and that 40% of all grass SINEs are near gene and the percentage is higher than other types of grass TEs. The pattern of enrichment suggests that differential removal of SINE copies in gene-poor regions plays an important role in shaping the genomic distribution of these elements. We also identify a sequence motif located at 3′ SINE end which is shared in 17 families. In short, this study provides insights into structure and evolution of SINEs in the grass family.