ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2021
An ancient, conserved gene regulatory network led to the rise of oral venom systems.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 34 papers.
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34 citing papers in PubMed, 54 citations in OpenAlex.
- Loss, persistence and reversal of phenotypic traits.Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society · 2026Review
- The Genetic Basis of Color Polymorphism in the Orb-Web SpiderEcology and evolution · 2026Article
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- Multi-omics characterization of toxin expression and producing organs in the predatory gastropods Monoplex corrugatus and Stramonita haemastoma.BMC genomics · 2026Article
- The green lacewing venom system and the complex mechanisms underlying its evolution.Molecular biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Genome of venomous caterpillarProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Molecular Mechanisms of Venom Diversity.Toxins · 2025Review
- Gene Expression Shifts in Emperor Penguin Adaptation to the Extreme Antarctic Environment.Molecular ecology · 2025Article
- The gene regulatory mechanisms shaping the heterogeneity of venom production in the Cape coral snake.Genome biology · 2025Article
- Redistribution of Ancestral Functions Underlies the Evolution of Venom Production in Marine Predatory Snails.Molecular biology and evolution · 2025Article
- A Vision for VenomsBase: An Integrated Knowledgebase for the Study of Venoms and Their Applications.Integrative organismal biology (Oxford, England) · 2025Article
- Ancient Secretory Pathways Contributed to the Evolutionary Origin of an Ecologically Impactful Bioluminescence System.Molecular biology and evolution · 2024Article
- Review
- Exploring the Diversity and Function of Serine Proteases in Toxicofera Reptile Venoms: A Comprehensive Overview.Toxins · 2024Review
- The distribution of fitness effects during adaptive walks using a simple genetic network.PLoS genetics · 2024Article
- The genetic regulatory architecture and epigenomic basis for age-related changes in rattlesnake venom.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Distinct regulatory networks control toxin gene expression in elapid and viperid snakes.BMC genomics · 2024Article
- ToxCodAn-Genome: an automated pipeline for toxin-gene annotation in genome assembly of venomous lineages.GigaScience · 2024Article
- Comprehensive isoform-level analysis reveals the contribution of alternative isoforms to venom evolution and repertoire diversity.Genome research · 2023Article
- Review
Corrections and comments
- Erratum issued
Authors and funding
2 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Oral venom systems evolved multiple times in numerous vertebrates enabling the exploitation of unique predatory niches. Yet how and when they evolved remains poorly understood. Up to now, most research on venom evolution has focused strictly on the toxins. However, using toxins present in modern day animals to trace the origin of the venom system is difficult, since they tend to evolve rapidly, show complex patterns of expression, and were incorporated into the venom arsenal relatively recently. Here we focus on gene regulatory networks associated with the production of toxins in snakes, rather than the toxins themselves. We found that overall venom gland gene expression was surprisingly well conserved when compared to salivary glands of other amniotes. We characterized the "metavenom network," a network of ∼3,000 nonsecreted housekeeping genes that are strongly coexpressed with the toxins, and are primarily involved in protein folding and modification. Conserved across amniotes, this network was coopted for venom evolution by exaptation of existing members and the recruitment of new toxin genes. For instance, starting from this common molecular foundation,
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