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Science 25 November 2005:
Vol. 310. no. 5752, pp. 1325 - 1326
DOI: 10.1126/science.1119089
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Reports

Vertebrate-Type Intron-Rich Genes in the Marine Annelid Platynereis dumerilii

Florian Raible,1,2* Kristin Tessmar-Raible,1 Kazutoyo Osoegawa,4 Patrick Wincker,5 Claire Jubin,5 Guillaume Balavoine,6 David Ferrier,7 Vladimir Benes,3 Pieter de Jong,4 Jean Weissenbach,5 Peer Bork,2 Detlev Arendt1*

Previous genome comparisons have suggested that one important trend in vertebrate evolution has been a sharp rise in intron abundance. By using genomic data and expressed sequence tags from the marine annelid Platynereis dumerilii, we provide direct evidence that about two-thirds of human introns predate the bilaterian radiation but were lost from insect and nematode genomes to a large extent. A comparison of coding exon sequences confirms the ancestral nature of Platynereis and human genes. Thus, the urbilaterian ancestor had complex, intron-rich genes that have been retained in Platynereis and human.

1 Developmental Unit, European Molecular Biological Laboratory (EMBL), Meyerhofstraße 1, D-69117 Heidelberg, Germany.
2 Computational Unit, European Molecular Biological Laboratory (EMBL), Meyerhofstraße 1, D-69117 Heidelberg, Germany.
3 Genomics Core Facility, European Molecular Biological Laboratory (EMBL), Meyerhofstraße 1, D-69117 Heidelberg, Germany.
4 Children's Hospital, Oakland Research Institute, 747 52nd Street, Oakland, CA 94609, USA.
5 Génoscope, Centre National de Séquençage and CNRS UMR 8030, 2 Rue Gaston Crémieux, CP 5706 91057 Evry Cedex, France.
6 Centre de Génétique Moléculaire du CNRS, Bâtiment 26, Avenue de la Terrasse, 91198 Gif-sur-Yvette, France.
7 Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3PS, UK.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: raible{at}embl.de (F.R.); arendt{at}embl.de (D.A.)

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