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The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests

Stenostomum are tiny planarians of the phylum Platyhelminthes that reproduce asexually. We transfected these worms using plasmids containing a gfp reporter gene. Here we show that they can express genes present in plasmids carried by bacteria and those that are encoded by naked DNA, such as plasmids...

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Autores principales: Rosa, Marcos Trindade, Loreto, Elgion L. S.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Nature Publishing Group UK 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6910973/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31836792
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-55659-w
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author Rosa, Marcos Trindade
Loreto, Elgion L. S.
author_facet Rosa, Marcos Trindade
Loreto, Elgion L. S.
author_sort Rosa, Marcos Trindade
collection PubMed
description Stenostomum are tiny planarians of the phylum Platyhelminthes that reproduce asexually. We transfected these worms using plasmids containing a gfp reporter gene. Here we show that they can express genes present in plasmids carried by bacteria and those that are encoded by naked DNA, such as plasmids or PCR fragments, transfected by electroporation; they can also express genes taken up during feeding. The microbiome associated with worm maintenance was evaluated, and the results indicated that when a plasmid is maintained in the microbiome, gfp gene expression is stable. When genes originate from naked DNA or bacteria not maintained in the microbiome, GFP expression is transient. Therefore, changes in the microbiome can modify the ability of worms to express foreign genes. In stable GFP-expressing worms, NSG showed that the gfp gene was maintained in the plasmid and was not integrated into the chromosome. These results suggest that, at least for some organisms such as flatworms, the expression of genes provided by the microbiome or the environment can be considered among the potential sources of phenotypic plasticity, which can have implications for evolvability.
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spelling pubmed-69109732019-12-16 The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests Rosa, Marcos Trindade Loreto, Elgion L. S. Sci Rep Article Stenostomum are tiny planarians of the phylum Platyhelminthes that reproduce asexually. We transfected these worms using plasmids containing a gfp reporter gene. Here we show that they can express genes present in plasmids carried by bacteria and those that are encoded by naked DNA, such as plasmids or PCR fragments, transfected by electroporation; they can also express genes taken up during feeding. The microbiome associated with worm maintenance was evaluated, and the results indicated that when a plasmid is maintained in the microbiome, gfp gene expression is stable. When genes originate from naked DNA or bacteria not maintained in the microbiome, GFP expression is transient. Therefore, changes in the microbiome can modify the ability of worms to express foreign genes. In stable GFP-expressing worms, NSG showed that the gfp gene was maintained in the plasmid and was not integrated into the chromosome. These results suggest that, at least for some organisms such as flatworms, the expression of genes provided by the microbiome or the environment can be considered among the potential sources of phenotypic plasticity, which can have implications for evolvability. Nature Publishing Group UK 2019-12-13 /pmc/articles/PMC6910973/ /pubmed/31836792 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-55659-w Text en © The Author(s) 2019 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Article
Rosa, Marcos Trindade
Loreto, Elgion L. S.
The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests
title The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests
title_full The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests
title_fullStr The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests
title_full_unstemmed The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests
title_short The Catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the DNA it ingests
title_sort catenulida flatworm can express genes from its microbiome or from the dna it ingests
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6910973/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31836792
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-55659-w
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