Department of Biology and The Carolina Center for Genome Sciences, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, NC 27599, USA.
Centromere function is remarkably conserved between species, yet the satellite sequences that make up centromeric DNA are highly divergent. Proteins that bind these sequences appear to be evolving under positive selection, supporting a model wherein the interplay between centromeric repeats and the proteins that bind them creates an opportunity for an intriguing phenomenon known as centromere-based meiotic drive.