Going Forward and Back: The Complex Evolutionary History of the GPx
Thomaz Stumpf Trenz,
Camila Luiza Delaix,
Andreia Carina Turchetto-Zolet,
Marcel Zamocky,
Fernanda Lazzarotto,
Márcia Margis-Pinheiro
Affiliations
Thomaz Stumpf Trenz
Programa de Pós-Graduação em Biologia Celular e Molecular, Centro de Biotecnologia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre 91509-900, Brazil
Camila Luiza Delaix
Graduação em Biotecnologia, Departamento de Biologia Molecular e Biotecnologia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre 91509-900, Brazil
Andreia Carina Turchetto-Zolet
Programa de Pós-Graduação em Genética e Biologia Molecular, Departamento de Genética, Instituto de Biociências, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre 91509-900, Brazil
Marcel Zamocky
Laboratory of Phylogenomic Ecology, Institute of Molecular Biology, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Dúbravská cesta 21, 84551 Bratislava, Slovakia
Fernanda Lazzarotto
Programa de Pós-Graduação em Biologia Celular e Molecular, Centro de Biotecnologia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre 91509-900, Brazil
Márcia Margis-Pinheiro
Programa de Pós-Graduação em Biologia Celular e Molecular, Centro de Biotecnologia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Porto Alegre 91509-900, Brazil
There is large diversity among glutathione peroxidase (GPx) enzymes regarding their function, structure, presence of the highly reactive selenocysteine (SeCys) residue, substrate usage, and reducing agent preference. Moreover, most vertebrate GPxs are very distinct from non-animal GPxs, and it is still unclear if they came from a common GPx ancestor. In this study, we aimed to unveil how GPx evolved throughout different phyla. Based on our phylogenetic trees and sequence analyses, we propose that all GPx encoding genes share a monomeric common ancestor and that the SeCys amino acid was incorporated early in the evolution of the metazoan kingdom. In addition, classical GPx and the cysteine-exclusive GPx07 have been present since non-bilaterian animals, but they seem to have been lost throughout evolution in different phyla. Therefore, the birth-and-death of GPx family members (like in other oxidoreductase families) seems to be an ongoing process, occurring independently across different kingdoms and phyla.
