@article {905756, title = {Physical Mapping and Refinement of the Painted Turtle Genome ( Chrysemys picta ) Inform Amniote Genome Evolution and Challenge Turtle-Bird Chromosomal Conservation}, journal = {Genome Biology and Evolution}, volume = {7}, number = {7}, year = {2015}, pages = {2038-2050}, abstract = {
Comparative genomics continues illuminating amniote genome evolution, but for man
y lineages our understanding remains incom-plete. Here, we refine the assembly (CPI 3.0.3 NCBI AHGY00000000.2) and develop a cytogenetic map of the painted turtle (Chrysemyspicta{\textemdash}CPI) genome, the first in turtles and in vertebrates with temperature-dependent sex determination. A comparison of turtle genomes with those of chicken, selected nonavian reptiles, and human revealed shared and novel genomic features, such as numerous chromosomal rearrangements. The largest conserved syntenic blocks between birds and turtles exist in four macrochro-mosomes, whereas rearrangements were evident in these and other chromosomes, disproving that turtles and birds retain fully
conserved macrochromosomes for greater than 300 Myr. C-banding re
vealed large heterochromatic blocks in the centromeric region
of only few chromosomes. The nucleolar-org
anizing region (NOR) mapped to a single CPI microchromosome, whereas in some turtles
and lizards the NOR maps to nonhomologous sex-chromosomes, t
hus revealing independent translocations of the NOR in various reptilian lineages. There was no evidence for recent chromosomal fusions as interstitial telomeric-DNA was absent. Some repeat elements (CR1-like, Gypsy) were enriched in the centromere s of five chromosomes, whereas others were widespread in the CPI
genome. Bacterial artificial chromosome (BAC) clones were hybridized to 18 of the 25 CPI chromosomes and anchored to a G-banded ideogram. Several CPI sex-determining genes mapped to five ch romosomes, and homology was detected between yet other CPI autosomes and the globally nonhomologous sex chromosomes of chicken, other turtles, and squamates, underscoring the inde-pendent evolution of vertebrate sex-determining mechanisms.
}, keywords = {chicken, chromosomal rearrangements, clone mapping, Evolution, genome and chromosome, genotypic sex determination, Human, nonmodel vertebrates, physical molecular cytogenetic bac, temperature-dependent and, translocations and inversions, turtles}, author = {Badenhorst, Daleen and Hillier, LaDeana W. and Literman, Robert and Montiel, Eugenia Elisabet and Radhakrishnan, Srihari and Shen, Yingjia and Minx, Patrick and Janes, Daniel E. and Warren, Wesley C. and Edwards, Scott V. and Valenzuela, Nicole} }