Abstract
Transposable elements (TEs, transposons) are mobile DNAs that are prevalent in most eukaryotic genomes. In plants, their mobility has vastly contributed to genetic diversity which is essential for adaptive changes and evolution of a species. Such mobile nature of transposon has been also actively exploited in plant science research by generating genetic mutants in non-model plant systems. On the other hand, transposon mobilization can bring about detrimental effects to host genomes and they are therefore mostly silenced by the epigenetic mechanisms. TEs have been studied as major silencing targets and acted a main feature in the remarkable growth of the plant epigenetics field. Despite the importance of transposon in plant biology and biotechnology, their mobilization and the underlying mechanisms are largely left unanswered. This is mainly because of the sequence repetitiveness of transposons, which makes their detection and analyses difficult and complicated. Recently, some attempts have been made to develop new experimental methods detecting active transposons and their mobilization behavior. These techniques reveal TE mobility in various levels, including the molecular, cellular, organismal and population scales. In this review, we will highlight the novel technical approaches in the study of mobile genetic elements and discuss how these techniques impacted on the advancement of transposon research and broadened our understanding of plant genome plasticity.
Highlights
Transposable elements (TEs or transposons) are stretches of DNA that move around the genomes and are ubiquitous in most eukaryotic genomes (Feschotte, 2008; Lisch, 2012; Chuong et al, 2017)
The mobilization of an long terminal repeat (LTR) retrotransposon is mediated by the reverse transcription of TE mRNAs to cDNAs, which happens in virus-like particles (VLPs) and is followed by the insertion to new genomic positions by the integrase
Tnt1 was used to generate genetic mutants in Medicago truncatula, Brachypodium distachyon, and Glycine max (D’Erfurth et al, 2003; Tadege et al, 2008; Revalska et al, 2011; Cui et al, 2012; Nandety et al, 2020), and the maize Ac/Ds DNA transposon system was used as a functional genomics tool in Arabidopsis, Oryza sativa, and Glycine max (Long et al, 1993; Mathieu et al, 2009; Wang et al, 2013)
Summary
Transposable elements (TEs or transposons) are stretches of DNA that move around the genomes and are ubiquitous in most eukaryotic genomes (Feschotte, 2008; Lisch, 2012; Chuong et al, 2017). The mobilization of an LTR retrotransposon is mediated by the reverse transcription of TE mRNAs to cDNAs ( referred to as extrachromosomal DNA, ecDNA), which happens in virus-like particles (VLPs) and is followed by the insertion to new genomic positions by the integrase Over the last several years, there have been significant efforts to unveil the landscape of transpositions in the plant genomes by developing novel experimental methods. These innovative approaches reveal the mobilomes at varying scales from molecular to population levels. We will introduce and discuss the up-to-date experimental techniques tracing mobile DNAs in the plant genomes
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