Study of chromatin diminution in Cyclops kolensis (Copepoda, Crustacea) by radiobiological methods

The experimental results show that at doses of 20 Gy and 100 Gy, the development of Cyclops kolensis Lilljeborg, 1901 (Copepoda, Cyclopoida) embryos ceases at the 16-cell stage, without affecting the course of chromatin diminution. A dose of 200 Gy terminated the process of chromatin diminution in some of the embryos. These results support the hypothesis that cytoplasmic factors in the egg play an important role in the process of chromatin diminution.

Chromatin Diminution in Cyclops kolensis Lill. (Copepoda, Crustacea) as a Radical Way to Inactivate Redundant Genome in Somatic Cells

Chromatin diminution (CD) is a phenomenon of programmed DNA elimination which takes place in early embryogenesis in some eukaryotes. The mechanism and biological role of CD remain largely unknown. During CD in the freshwater copepod Cyclops kolensis, the genome of cells of the somatic lineage is reorganized and reduced in size by more than 90% without affecting the genome of germline cells. Although the diploid chromosome number is unchanged, chromosome size is dramatically reduced by CD. The eliminated DNA consists primarily of repetitive sequences and localizes within granules during the elimination process. In this review, we provide an overview of CD in C. kolensis including both cytological and molecular studies.

Chromatin diminution in the copepod Mesocyclops edax: elimination of both highly repetitive and nonhighly repetitive DNA

Chromatin diminution, a developmentally regulated process of DNA elimination, is found in numerous eukaryotic species. In the copepod Mesocyclops edax, some 90% of its genomic DNA is eliminated during the differentiation of embryonic cells into somatic cells. Previous studies have shown that the eliminated DNA contains highly repetitive sequences. Here, we sequenced DNA fragments from pre- and postdiminution cells to determine whether nonhighly repetitive sequences are also eliminated during the process of chromatin diminution. Comparative analyses of these sequences, as well as the sequences eliminated from the genome of the copepod Cyclops kolensis, show that they all share similar abundances of tandem repeats, dispersed repeats, transposable elements, and various coding and noncoding sequences. This suggests that, in the chromatin diminution observed in M. edax, both highly repetitive and nonhighly repetitive sequences are eliminated and that there is no bias in the type of nonhighly repetitive DNA being eliminated.