ArticleBMC evolutionary biology2017
Visual adaptation in Lake Victoria cichlid fishes: depth-related variation of color and scotopic opsins in species from sand/mud bottoms.
Article in BMC evolutionary biology, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers.
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21 citing papers in PubMed, 43 citations in OpenAlex.
- Visual pigments of basal lineages of bony fishes support independent ecological shifts from a shallow marine to a freshwater niche.Evolution letters · 2026Article
- Tempo and drivers of 3D eye size evolution in temperate butterflies.Evolution letters · 2026Article
- Differential expression genes in the eye-transcriptomes of the riverine and marine grass puffer (Takifugu niphobles).Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Seeing in the Deep: Evolution of the Opsin Gene Expression in Bermin Crater Lake Cichlids.Molecular biology and evolution · 2025Article
- Exome analysis reveals species divergence in TYR and identifies species genetic markers in five endemic Macaca species on Sulawesi Island.BMC ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Lateral line system diversification during the early stages of ecological speciation in cichlid fish.BMC ecology and evolution · 2024Article
- Color vision evolution in egg-laying mammals: insights from visual photoreceptors and daily activities of Australian echidnas.Zoological letters · 2024Article
- Visual opsin gene expression evolution in the adaptive radiation of cichlid fishes of Lake Tanganyika.Science advances · 2023Article
- Long-wavelength-sensitive (lws) opsin gene expression, foraging and visual communication in coral reef fishes.Molecular ecology · 2023Article
- Contribution of opsins and chromophores to cone pigment variation across populations of Lake Victoria cichlids.Journal of fish biology · 2022Article
- Molecular evolution and depth-related adaptations of rhodopsin in the adaptive radiation of cichlid fishes in Lake Tanganyika.Molecular ecology · 2022Article
- Correlated Expression of the Opsin Retrogene LWS-R and its Host Gene in Two Poeciliid Fishes.Zoological studies · 2022Article
- Genomic Signatures for Species-Specific Adaptation in Lake Victoria Cichlids Derived from Large-Scale Standing Genetic Variation.Molecular biology and evolution · 2021Article
- Vitamin ADevelopmental biology · 2021Review
- Diversity in rest-activity patterns among Lake Malawi cichlid fishes suggests a novel axis of habitat partitioning.The Journal of experimental biology · 2021Article
- Genomic landscape of geographically structured colour polymorphism in a temperate marine fish.Molecular ecology · 2021Article
- Axes of visual adaptation in the ecologically diverse family Cichlidae.Seminars in cell & developmental biology · 2020Review
- Visual pigment evolution in Characiformes: The dynamic interplay of teleost whole-genome duplication, surviving opsins and spectral tuning.Molecular ecology · 2020Article
- Seeing the rainbow: mechanisms underlying spectral sensitivity in teleost fishes.The Journal of experimental biology · 2020Review
- Patterns of genomic differentiation between two Lake Victoria cichlid species, Haplochromis pyrrhocephalus and H. sp. 'macula'.BMC evolutionary biology · 2019Article
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Authors and funding
13 authors at 7 institutions in 4 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundFor Lake Victoria cichlid species inhabiting rocky substrates with differing light regimes, it has been proposed that adaptation of the long-wavelength-sensitive (LWS) opsin gene triggered speciation by sensory drive through color signal divergence. The extensive and continuous sand/mud substrates are also species-rich, and a correlation between male nuptial coloration and the absorption of LWS pigments has been reported. However, the factors driving genetic and functional diversity of LWS pigments in sand/mud habitats are still unresolved.
resultsTo address this issue, nucleotide sequences of eight opsin genes were compared in ten Lake Victoria cichlid species collected from sand/mud bottoms. Among eight opsins, the LWS and rod-opsin (RH1) alleles were diversified and one particular allele was dominant or fixed in each species. Natural selection has acted on and fixed LWS alleles in each species. The functions of LWS and RH1 alleles were measured by absorption of reconstituted A1- and A2-derived visual pigments. The absorption of pigments from RH1 alleles most common in deep water were largely shifted toward red, whereas those of LWS alleles were largely shifted toward blue in both A1 and A2 pigments. In both RH1 and LWS pigments, A2-derived pigments were closer to the dominant light in deep water, suggesting the possibility of the adaptation of A2-derived pigments to depth-dependent light regimes.
conclusionsThe RH1 and LWS sequences may be diversified for adaptation of A2-derived pigments to different light environments in sand/mud substrates. Diversification of the LWS alleles may have originally taken place in riverine environments, with a new mutation occurring subsequently in Lake Victoria.
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