Human-specific changes in two functional enhancers of FOXP2

Antonio Benítez-Burraco; Raúl Torres-Ruiz; Pere Gelabert; Carles Lalueza-Fox; Sandra Rodríguez-Perales; Paloma García-Bellido

doi:10.14715/cmb/2022.68.11.3

Human-specific changes in two functional enhancers of FOXP2

Antonio Benítez-Burraco, Raúl Torres-Ruiz, Pere Gelabert, Carles Lalueza-Fox, Sandra Rodríguez-Perales, Paloma García-Bellido

Department of Evolutionary Anthropology

Publications: Contribution to journal › Article › Peer Reviewed

Abstract

FOXP2 is a gene involved in language development and function. Neanderthals and humans share the same coding region of the gene, although the formers are thought to have exhibited less sophisticated language abilities. In this paper, we report on several human-specific changes in two functional enhancers of FOXP2. Two of these variants are located within the binding sites for the transcription factors POLR2A and SMARCC1, respectively. Interestingly, SMARCC1 is involved in brain development and vitamin D metabolism. We hypothesize that the human specific change in this position might have resulted in a different regulation pattern of FOXP2 expression in our species compared to extinct hominins, with a potential impact on our language abilities.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	16-19
Number of pages	4
Journal	Cellular and molecular biology
Volume	68
Issue number	11
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.14715/cmb/2022.68.11.3
Publication status	Published - 30 Nov 2022

Austrian Fields of Science 2012

106012 Evolutionary research

Keywords

Humans
Forkhead Transcription Factors/genetics
language evolution
SMARCC1
enhancers
Human evolution
Neanderthals
FOXP2

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10.14715/cmb/2022.68.11.3

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AU - Benítez-Burraco, Antonio

AU - Torres-Ruiz, Raúl

AU - Gelabert, Pere

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AU - Rodríguez-Perales, Sandra

AU - García-Bellido, Paloma

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Human-specific changes in two functional enhancers of FOXP2

Abstract

Austrian Fields of Science 2012

Keywords

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