Open AccessGene evolutionary trajectories in Mycobacterium tuberculosis reveal temporal signs of selection
Author(s) -
Álvaro ChinerOms,
Mariana G. López,
Miguel Moreno-Molina,
Victoria Furió,
Iñaki Comas
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
proceedings of the national academy of sciences of the united states of america
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1091-6490
pISSN - 0027-8424
DOI - 10.1073/pnas.2113600119
Subject(s) - biology , mycobacterium tuberculosis complex , mycobacterium tuberculosis , tuberculosis , genetics , pathogen , genome , selection (genetic algorithm) , population , gene , evolutionary biology , computational biology , medicine , pathology , artificial intelligence , computer science , environmental health
Significance Previous attempts to identify the action of natural selection in theMycobacterium tuberculosis complex (MTBC) were limited by sample size and averaging across time and lineages. We investigate changes in selective pressures across time for every single gene of the MTBC. We developed a methodology to analyze temporal signals of selection in a large dataset (∼5,000 complete genomes) and showed that 1) almost half of the genes seem to have been under positive selection at some point in time; 2) experimentally confirmed epitopes tend to accumulate more mutations in deeper branches than in external branches; and 3) temporal signals identify genes that were conserved in the past but under positive selection in the present, suggesting ongoing adaptation to the host.