Where does this statement come from?

Model Organism: Worms Scientific Discussion
1

From the following link http://www.biologie.ens.fr/bcsgnce/spip.php?article2

I notice this statement : Completion of the C. elegans genome sequence in 1998 demonstrated that almost all gene families involved in neuron function in mammals are present in the worm.

Does anyone know what sources he used to draw this conclusion?

2

Well, the obvious place to cite would be Cori Bargmann’s neurobiology review from the 1998 issue of Science announcing the C. elegans genome, although it’s not a direct quotation and there may be some other reference that makes that claim in so many words or at least comes closer to doing so.

3

I guess you mean…what source is Jean-Louis Bessereau using when he states that 'almost all gene families involved in neuron function in mammals are present in the worm.
'?

Well, given it’s his area of interest and he has probably studied which neuron- related gene families are present…then it’s not a great leap of the imagination to think he probably conceived the sentence himself :-\

Or do you actually mean something else?

4

Thanks for your response. Sorry that I didn’t make myself clear. Your guess is right about my question. I don’t know how he came to such conclusion as he didn’t refer to any article.

5

It’s common to find on lab websites or Faculty pages, narrative descriptions of research. For example, the website for the David H Fitch lab (as they are currently posting on the forum and do some very nice work):

http://biology.as.nyu.edu/object/DavidFitch.html

Their research is described elegantly, without being peppered with journal references (which are to hand should you ask the question, ‘how does he know that?’.

6

I cannot find this link and the statement anymore:
link http://www.biologie.ens.fr/bcsgnce/spip.php?article2
statement : Completion of the C. elegans genome sequence in 1998 demonstrated that almost all gene families involved in neuron function in mammals are present in the worm.

Can anyone help?

7

He is now at:

http://cgphimc.univ-lyon1.fr/spip.php?rubrique199&lang=fr

and the statement isn’t, but you’ve read it already and it wasn’t directly citable so that’s ok.

8

as semi-related tidbit:

In the yet to come WS247 version of WormBase, 9.518 out of 20.395 protein coding C.elegans genes will have predicted human orthologs.
So I would assume if you extend it to all mammals and gene families instead of single genes, at the very least you could do an “the majority of gene families is conserved in mammals” statement.

as quick and dirty approach: there are 13 genes with GO:0048666 neuron development, of which 10 have orthologs in human.

disclaimer: if you include the descendants of the term the percentage might be higher (or lower)

9

Thank you both very much for your input!!