Maia Kaplan - Intron gain via transposon insertion in Arabidopsis lyrata.

While deletion and recombination are documented mechanisms of intron loss, characterizing the mechanisms of gain has proven more evasive. In this work, select members of the Brassicaceae family are compared by orthologous sequences to detect intron gains in Arabidopsis lyrata. Our approach applies phylogenetic inference allowing us to distinguish between gain and loss, resulting in 17 novel introns of interest. Surprisingly, most of these seem to originate from the insertion of repetitive elements. By examining the sequences of these introns, we describe potential mechanisms for how transposable elements insert themselves into coding sequences to create new introns. We will then briefly explain why this may provide a selective advantage to both the host and repetitive element.