Evolution and transition of expression trajectory during human brain development

BMC Evolutionary Biology

article

Li, Ming-Li¹  Chen, Luonan³  Li, Yan⁶  Wu, Dong-Dong¹  Tang, Hui³  Shao, Yong¹  Wang, Ming-Shan¹  Xu, Hai-Bo¹  Wang, Sheng¹  Irwin, David M.¹  Adeola, Adeniyi C.¹  Zeng, Tao³ 

[1] State Key Laboratory of Genetic Resources and Evolution, Kunming Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences;Kunming College of Life Science, University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences;State Key Laboratory of Cell Biology, Shanghai Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Center for Excellence in Molecular Cell Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences;Key Laboratory of Systems Biology, Hangzhou Institute for Advanced Study, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences;Center for Excellence in Animal Evolution and Genetics, Chinese Academy of Sciences;State Key Laboratory for Conservation and Utilization of Bio-Resource, Yunnan University;Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, University of Toronto;Banting and Best Diabetes Centre, University of Toronto

关键词: Humans;    Macaques;    Expression trajectory;    Transcriptome;    Brain evolution;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12862-020-01633-4

学科分类：护理学

来源: BioMed Central

【 摘 要 】

The remarkable abilities of the human brain are distinctive features that set us apart from other animals. However, our understanding of how the brain has changed in the human lineage remains incomplete, but is essential for understanding cognition, behavior, and brain disorders in humans. Here, we compared the expression trajectory in brain development between humans and rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) to explore their divergent transcriptome profiles. Results showed that brain development could be divided into two stages, with a demarcation date in a range between 25 and 26 postconception weeks (PCW) for humans and 17-23PCWfor rhesus macaques, rather than birth time that have been widely used as a uniform demarcation time of neurodevelopment across species. Dynamic network biomarker (DNB) analysis revealed that the two demarcation dates were transition phases during brain development, after which the brain transcriptome profiles underwent critical transitions characterized by highly fluctuating DNB molecules. We also found that changes between early and later brain developmental stages (as defined by the demarcation points) were substantially greater in the human brain than in the macaque brain. To explore the molecular mechanism underlying prolonged timing during early human brain development, we carried out expression heterochrony tests. Results demonstrated that compared to macaques, more heterochronic genes exhibited neoteny during early human brain development, consistent with the delayed demarcation time in the human lineage, and proving that neoteny in human brain development could be traced to the prenatal period. We further constructed transcriptional networks to explore the profile of early human brain development and identified the hub gene RBFOX1 as playing an important role in regulating early brain development. We also found RBFOX1 evolved rapidly in its non-coding regions, indicating that this gene played an important role in human brain evolution. Our findings provide evidence that RBFOX1 is a likely key hub gene in early human brain development and evolution. By comparing gene expression profiles between humans and macaques, we found divergent expression trajectories between the two species, which deepens our understanding of the evolution of the human brain.

【 授权许可】

CC BY|CC0