LTR retrotransposons sculpt the origin of point centromeres in yeasts
Researchers map centromeres across Saccharomycodales and find proto-point centromeres—compact, single Cse4 nucleosomes on AT-rich CDEII with variable flanking motifs—often embedded in Ty5 LTR retrotransposon clusters. Phylogenetic analyses suggest proto-point and point centromeres share an ancient origin and that Ty5 elements provided the genetic substrate for the evolution of genetically defined point centromeres, illustrating how selfish elements can be co-opted for essential chromosome segregation.