An autonomous transposable element encodes functional machinery needed to mobilize itself in a compatible cellular setting. A non-autonomous transposable element instead lacks some of that machinery and can depend on a compatible source elsewhere. Autonomous describes this genetic capability; it does not mean independence from the host biological cell, suitable expression or all host proteins.[ref]
A unified classification system for eukaryotic transposable elements by Thomas Wicker and others. Autonomous/non-autonomous classification across transposable-element groups
The P element provides a concrete distinction. An autonomous element can encode P-element transposase, whereas a P-element vector can retain recognition sequences while depending on enzyme supplied separately. In a 1986 study, an approximately 87-kilodalton protein associated with a particular processed transcript was linked to excision of a non-autonomous transposable element. Combining immunochemical identification with an activity assay connected a coding product to a function.[ref]
Imagine a host carrying an autonomous donor
A and a recognizable but non-autonomous carrier B. Enzyme produced from A can supply the missing function for B; observing movement of B would not make B autonomous. Conversely, failure to observe movement during one experiment would not show that A lacks its coding machinery: expression and cellular conditions also affect the readout. The classification separates inherited capacity from an event measured under particular conditions. Articles by others on the same topic
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