What Are Domain Fusion And Domain Fission?

Question

[Doug]

I looked both of these up in Molecular Biology of the Cell and didn't find more than a mention of them -- no definition. Also Google doesn't seem to bring up anything useful -- just use of the terms, but no definitions.

[David Quigley]

MBOC and google are good resources, but I suggest you try pubmed first: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term="domain fusion"[Title]

Answer 1

[Doug]

"Domain fusion allows for a prediction of functional relationship between two distinct genes in an organism if those two genes are fused as a continuous sequence in another organism. The fused gene in one organism suggests a relationship between the component genes in another organism - a relationship which is not necessarily due to sequence similarity. Fusion links frequently relate genes of the same functional category. Therefore, the function of an uncharacterized gene within a fusion link can be inferred from the known function of the gene to which it is fused."

Source: combrex.bu.edu/FAQ.html#faq_whatIsDomainFusion?

I'm going to infer that domain fission would also provide some statistical hint that the genes are not related.

Answer 2

[raunakms]

This paper contains some information and few citations on the relevant topic. http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2105/4/16