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Helicosporidia: a genomic snapshot of an early transition to parasitism

Yukun Sun,Jean-François Pombert

Published 2014 in Acta Societatis Botanicorum Poloniae

ABSTRACT

Helicosporidia are gut parasites of invertebrates. These achlorophyllous, non-photosynthetic green algae are the first reported to infect insects. Helicosporidia are members of the green algal class Trebouxiophyceae and are further related to the photosynthetic and non-photosynthetic genera Auxenochlorella and Prototheca , respectively, the latter of which can also turn to parasitism under opportunistic conditions. Molecular analyses suggest that Helicosporidia diverged from other photosynthetic trebouxiophytes less than 200 million years ago and that its adaptation to parasitism is therefore recent. In this minireview, we summarize the current knowledge of helicosporidian genomics. Unlike many well-known parasitic lineages, the Helicosporidium sp. organelle and nuclear genomes have lost surprisingly little in terms of coding content aside from photosynthesis-related genes. While the small size of its nuclear genome compared to other sequenced trebouxiophycean representatives suggests that Helicosporidium is going through a streamlining process, this scenario cannot be ascertained at this stage. Genome expansions and contractions have occurred independently multiple times in the green algae, and the small size of the Helicosporidium genome may reflect a lack of expansion from a lean ancestor state rather than a tendency towards reduction.

PUBLICATION RECORD

  • Publication year

    2014

  • Venue

    Acta Societatis Botanicorum Poloniae

  • Publication date

    2014-12-31

  • Fields of study

    Biology, Environmental Science

  • Identifiers
    DOI 10.5586/ASBP.2014.039
  • External record

    Open on Semantic Scholar

  • Source metadata

    Semantic Scholar

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