Marine medaka ATP-binding cassette (ABC) superfamily and new insight into teleost Abch nomenclature

The ABC gene family is recognized as one of the largest gene families in all kingdoms of life. Although many genes involved in the ABC superfamily have been annotated from several fish species, information on large sets of the ABC superfamily and their evolutionary characterization are still unclear. In the marine medaka Oryzias melastigma, 50 ABC transporters were identified with bioinformatics-aided in silico analyses and their full-length cDNA sequences were characterized. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that they could be classified into the eight subfamilies (A–H) that include all members of all ABC subfamilies. Interestingly, several teleosts’ Abcg members were closely clustered with Abch members in a distinctive clade. The abch gene was also observed in the coelacanth and the spotted gar, suggesting that this gene was retained from a bilaterian ancestor and that a gene loss event recently occurred in the tetrapod lineage. In teleosts, the nomenclature of previously annotated abcg genes should be considered carefully, as they form a distinctive clade with the marine medaka abch subfamily and other teleost abch genes, but not with the members of the Abcg subfamily.