Neue Publikation!Epistatic effects between amino acid insertions and substitutions mediate toxin-resistance of vertebrate Na+,K+-ATPases

21. November 2022, von Shabnam Mohammadi

Foto: Shabnam Mohammadi

We found that chinchillas and sandgrouse have independently evolved single amino-acid insertions in the same region of their sodium-potassium pump proteins. These proteins are the molecular target of a very common chemical defense toxin found throughout the animal and plant kingdoms. We investigated the effects of these insertions in combination with other mutations at nearby sites in the protein and found that they can either produce or diminish resistance to these toxins depending on whether another mutation was present. Our results highlight how molecular interactions within a protein can alter the effects of mutations, and thus explain patterns of convergence, divergence, and parallelism in molecular evolution.

doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.09.01.506169