The relationship of a prochlorophyte Prochlorothrix hollandicato green chloroplasts (original) (raw)

Nature volume 337, pages 380–382 (1989)Cite this article

Abstract

It is generally accepted that chloroplasts arose from one or more endosymbiotic events between an ancestral cyanobacterium and a eukaryote1. Such an origin fits well in the case of the chloroplasts of rhodophytes that, like cyanobacteria, contain chlorophyll a and phycobilin pigments2. The green chloroplasts from higher plants, green algae, and euglenoids however, contain chlorophyll b as well as chlorophyll a, and lack phycobilins. Consequently, it has been suggested that they arose independently of the rhodophyte chloroplasts, from an ancestral prokaryote containing that complement of pigments3. The 'prochlorophytes'Prochloron didemni (an exosymbiont on didemnid ascidians4,5) and Prochlorothrix hollandica(a recently discovered, free-living, filamentous form6) have been suggested to be modern counterparts of the ancestor of the green chloroplasts because they are prokaryotes that also contain both chlorophylls a and ft, and lack phycobilins7,8. We report here a 16S rRNA-based phylogenetic analysis of P. hollandica. The organism is found to fall within the cyanobacterial line of descent, as do the green chloroplasts, but it is not a specific relative of green chloroplasts. Thus, similar pigment compositions do not necessarily reflect close evolutionary relationships.

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Author notes

  1. Stephen J. Giovannoni
    Present address: Department of Microbiology, Oregon State University, Corvallis, Oregon, 97331, USA

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology and Institute for Molecular and Cellular Biology, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, 47405, USA
    Seán Turner, Stephen J. Giovannoni & Norman R. Pace
  2. Laboratory for Microbiology, University of Amsterdam, Nieuwe Achtergracht 127, Amsterdam, 1018 WS, The Netherlands
    Tineke Burger-Wiersma & Luuc R. Mur

Authors

  1. Seán Turner
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  2. Tineke Burger-Wiersma
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  3. Stephen J. Giovannoni
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  4. Luuc R. Mur
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  5. Norman R. Pace
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Turner, S., Burger-Wiersma, T., Giovannoni, S. et al. The relationship of a prochlorophyte _Prochlorothrix hollandica_to green chloroplasts.Nature 337, 380–382 (1989). https://doi.org/10.1038/337380a0

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