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A universal trend of amino acid gain and loss in protein evolution

Nature volume 433, pages 633–638 (2005)Cite this article

A Corrigendum to this article was published on 26 May 2005

Abstract

Amino acid composition of proteins varies substantially between taxa and, thus, can evolve. For example, proteins from organisms with (G + C)-rich (or (A + T)-rich) genomes contain more (or fewer) amino acids encoded by (G + C)-rich codons1,2,3,4. However, no universal trends in ongoing changes of amino acid frequencies have been reported. We compared sets of orthologous proteins encoded by triplets of closely related genomes from 15 taxa representing all three domains of life (Bacteria, Archaea and Eukaryota), and used phylogenies to polarize amino acid substitutions. Cys, Met, His, Ser and Phe accrue in at least 14 taxa, whereas Pro, Ala, Glu and Gly are consistently lost. The same nine amino acids are currently accrued or lost in human proteins, as shown by analysis of non-synonymous single-nucleotide polymorphisms. All amino acids with declining frequencies are thought to be among the first incorporated into the genetic code; conversely, all amino acids with increasing frequencies, except Ser, were probably recruited late5,6,7. Thus, expansion of initially under-represented amino acids, which began over 3,400 million years ago8,9, apparently continues to this day.

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Acknowledgements

S.S. and I.A.A. were supported by the Genome Canada Foundation.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Center for Biotechnology Information, NIH, Bethesda, Maryland, 20894, USA

    I. King Jordan, Yuri I. Wolf, Eugene V. Koonin & Alexey S. Kondrashov

  2. Section of Evolution and Ecology, University of California at Davis, Davis, California, 95616, USA

    Fyodor A. Kondrashov

  3. Division of Genetics, Department of Medicine, Brigham & Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, 02115, USA

    Ivan A. Adzhubei & Shamil Sunyaev

Authors
  1. I. King Jordan
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  2. Fyodor A. Kondrashov
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  3. Ivan A. Adzhubei
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  4. Yuri I. Wolf
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  5. Eugene V. Koonin
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  6. Alexey S. Kondrashov
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  7. Shamil Sunyaev
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Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Alexey S. Kondrashov or Shamil Sunyaev.

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Supplementary information

Supplementary Tables

Contains Supplementary Tables 1-3. Supplementary Table 1 shows the changes of frequencies of all amino acids in the 15 taxa. Supplementary Table 2 shows the long-term rates of amino acid gain and loss. Supplementary Table 3 shows the order of the recruitment of amino acids into the genetic code. (DOC 243 kb)

Supplementary Methods

This section describes the method used to correct for possible multiple substitutions at aligned amino acid sites. (DOC 47 kb)

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Jordan, I., Kondrashov, F., Adzhubei, I. et al. A universal trend of amino acid gain and loss in protein evolution. Nature 433, 633–638 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature03306

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