TY - JOUR

T1 - Losing Genes

T2 - The Evolutionary Remodeling of Cetacea Skin

AU - Espregueira Themudo, Gonçalo

AU - Alves, Luís Q.

AU - Machado, André M.

AU - Lopes-Marques, Mónica

AU - da Fonseca, Rute R.

AU - Fonseca, Miguel

AU - Ruivo, Raquel

AU - Castro, L. Filipe C.

PY - 2020

Y1 - 2020

N2 - The skin is a multi-layered organ, often displaying associated structures, that establishes a protective interface between the organism and the surrounding environment. In mammals, the skin provides a physical and immune barrier, while contributing to thermoregulation and water balance. Within cetaceans, the archetypal mammalian skin was drastically reshaped and remodeled, emerging as a striking feature of their successful adaptation to a fully aquatic lifestyle. In fact, cetacean skin is extremely thick, displays a high cellular turnover rate, and lacks typical mammalian pelages, as well as sebaceous glands, resulting in a smooth and drag-reducing skin. Curiously, at the genome level, the majority of cetacean skin-related innovations resulted from episodes of gene loss: spanning diverse processes such as skin keratinization and cornification, immunity and inflammation or lubrication. Here, we review how the cetacean skin was shaped by such an evolutionary mechanism, by describing the full set of genes with inactivating mutations in the various functional compartments of the skin.

AB - The skin is a multi-layered organ, often displaying associated structures, that establishes a protective interface between the organism and the surrounding environment. In mammals, the skin provides a physical and immune barrier, while contributing to thermoregulation and water balance. Within cetaceans, the archetypal mammalian skin was drastically reshaped and remodeled, emerging as a striking feature of their successful adaptation to a fully aquatic lifestyle. In fact, cetacean skin is extremely thick, displays a high cellular turnover rate, and lacks typical mammalian pelages, as well as sebaceous glands, resulting in a smooth and drag-reducing skin. Curiously, at the genome level, the majority of cetacean skin-related innovations resulted from episodes of gene loss: spanning diverse processes such as skin keratinization and cornification, immunity and inflammation or lubrication. Here, we review how the cetacean skin was shaped by such an evolutionary mechanism, by describing the full set of genes with inactivating mutations in the various functional compartments of the skin.

KW - cetacean

KW - gene loss

KW - genome

KW - lossOme

KW - skin

U2 - 10.3389/fmars.2020.592375

DO - 10.3389/fmars.2020.592375

M3 - Review

AN - SCOPUS:85095809889

VL - 7

JO - Frontiers in Marine Science

JF - Frontiers in Marine Science

SN - 2296-7745

M1 - 592375

ER -