Insights into molecular evolution from yeast genomics

Abstract

Enabled by comparative genomics, yeasts have increasingly developed into a powerful model system for molecular evolution. Here we survey several areas in which yeast studies have made important contributions, including regulatory evolution, gene duplication and divergence, evolution of gene order and evolution of complexity. In each area we highlight key studies and findings based on techniques ranging from statistical analysis of large datasets to direct laboratory measurements of fitness. Future work will combine traditional evolutionary genetics analysis and experimental evolution with tools from systems biology to yield mechanistic insight into complex phenotypes.

Keywords: comparative genomics; complex phenotypes; experimental evolution; functional genomics; functional synthesis; gene duplication; gene order; molecular evolution; population genomics; regulatory evolution.