@article{1941, author = {Ian T. Fiddes and Gerrald A. Lodewijk and Meghan Mooring and Colleen M. Bosworth and Adam D. Ewing and Gary L. Mantalas and Adam M. Novak and Anouk van den Bout and Alex Bishara and Jimi L. Rosenkrantz and Ryan Lorig-Roach and Andrew R. Field and Maximilian Haeussler and Lotte Russo and Aparna Bhaduri and Tomasz J. Nowakowski and Alex A. Pollen and Max L. Dougherty and Xander Nuttle and Marie-Claude Addor and Simon Zwolinski and Sol Katzman and Arnold Kriegstein and Evan E. Eichler and Sofie R. Salama and Frank M.J. Jacobs and David Haussler}, title = {Human-specific NOTCH2NL genes affect Notch signaling and cortical neurogenesis}, abstract = {Genetic changes causing brain size expansion in human evolution have remained elusive. Notch signaling is essential for radial glia stem cell proliferation and is a determinant of neuronal number in the mammalian cortex. We find three paralogs of human-specific NOTCH2NL are highly expressed in radial glia. Functional analysis reveals different alleles of NOTCH2NL have varying potencies to enhance Notch signaling by interacting directly with NOTCH receptors. Consistent with a role in Notch signaling, NOTCH2NL ectopic expression delays differentiation of neuronal progenitors, while deletion accelerates differentiation into cortical neurons. Furthermore, NOTCH2NL genes provide the breakpoints in 1q21.1 distal deletion/duplication syndrome, where duplications are associated with macrocephaly and autism, and deletions with microcephaly and schizophrenia. Thus, the emergence of human-specific NOTCH2NL genes may have contributed to the rapid evolution of the larger human neocortex accompanied by loss of genomic stability at the 1q21.1 locus and resulting recurrent neurodevelopmental disorders., Human-specific Notch paralogs are expressed in radial glia, enhance Notch signaling and impact neuronal differentiation.,}, year = {2018}, journal = {Cell}, volume = {173}, pages = {1356-1369.e22}, month = {2018-5-31}, issn = {0092-8674}, url = {https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5986104/}, doi = {10.1016/j.cell.2018.03.051}, }