Evidence map›Paper›PMID 11390979›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2001

A gene family required for human germ cell development evolved from an ancient meiotic gene conserved in metazoans.

E Y Xu, F L Moore, R A Pera

Open access · bronzeAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2001. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 92 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
92citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
7.9field-weighted citation impact, top 2% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

92 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 261 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Pooled it
  2. Article
  3. Review
  4. Article
  5. Article
  6. Article
  7. Article
  8. Article
  9. Article
  10. Human sperm RNA in male infertility.Nature reviews. Urology · 2025
    Review
  11. Article
  12. Article
  13. Porcine Germ Cells Phenotype during Embryonic and Adult Development.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2023
    Article
  14. Article
  15. Article
  16. Article
  17. Article
  18. Article
  19. Article
  20. Review

32 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.

E Y XuDepartment of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Sciences, University of California, San Francisco, CA 94143-0546, USA.
F L Moore
R A Pera
University of California, San Francisco · USCancer Genetics (United States) · US

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The Deleted in AZoospermia (DAZ) genes encode potential RNA-binding proteins that are expressed exclusively in prenatal and postnatal germ cells and are strong candidates for human fertility factors. Here we report the identification of an additional member of the DAZ gene family, which we have called BOULE. With the identification of this gene, it is clear that the human DAZ gene family contains at least three members: DAZ, a Y-chromosome gene cluster that arose 30-40 million years ago and whose deletion is linked to infertility in men; DAZL, the "father" of DAZ, a gene that maps to human chromosome 3 and has homologs required for both female and male germ cell development in other organisms; and BOULE, a gene that we propose is the "grandfather" of DAZ and maps to human chromosome 2. Human and mouse BOULE resemble the invertebrate meiotic regulator Boule, the proposed ortholog of DAZ, in sequence and expression pattern and hence likely perform a similar meiotic function. In contrast, the previously identified human DAZ and DAZL are expressed much earlier than BOULE in prenatal germ stem cells and spermatogonia; DAZL also is expressed in female germ cells. These data suggest that homologs of the DAZ gene family can be grouped into two subfamilies (BOULE and DAZL) and that members of the DAZ family evolved from an ancestral meiotic regulator, Boule, to assume distinct, yet overlapping, functions in germ cell development.

Indexed as

Drosophila ProteinsEvolution, MolecularMultigene FamilyAmino Acid SequenceAnimalsConserved SequenceDeleted in Azoospermia 1 ProteinDrosophilaFemaleHumansMaleMiceMolecular Sequence DataOvaryOvumPhylogenybol protein, DrosophilaDAZ1 protein, humanDeleted in Azoospermia 1 ProteinDrosophila ProteinsRNA-Binding Proteins

Identifiers

PMID11390979
PMCPMC34683
OpenAlexW2025701349

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.