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Dosage analysis of the 7q11.23 Williams region identifies BAZ1B as a major human gene patterning the modern human face and underlying self-domestication

Zanella, Matteo; Vitriolo, Alessandro; Andirko, Alejandro; Tiago Martins, Pedro; Sturm, Stefanie; O'Rourke, Thomas; Laugsch, Magdalena; Malerba, Natascia; Skaros, Adrianos; Trattaro, Sebastiano; Germain, Pierre-Luc; Mihailovic, Marija; Merla, Giuseppe; Rad

SCIENCE ADVANCES
2019
VL / 5 - BP / - EP /
abstract
We undertook a functional dissection of chromatin remodeler BAZ1B in neural crest (NC) stem cells (NCSCs) from a uniquely informative cohort of typical and atypical patients harboring 7q11.23 copy number variants. Our results reveal a key contribution of BAZ1B to NCSC in vitro induction and migration, coupled with a crucial involvement in NC-specific transcriptional circuits and distal regulation. By intersecting our experimental data with new paleogenetic analyses comparing modern and archaic humans, we found a modern-specific enrichment for regulatory changes both in BAZ1B and its experimentally defined downstream targets, thereby providing the first empirical validation of the human self-domestication hypothesis and positioning BAZ1B as a master regulator of the modern human face. In so doing, we provide experimental evidence that the craniofacial and cognitive/behavioral phenotypes caused by alterations of the Williams-Beuren syndrome critical region can serve as a powerful entry point into the evolution of the modern human face and prosociality.

AccesS level

Green submitted, Green published, Gold

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