TY - JOUR
T1 - Horizontal Gene Transfer in Eukaryotes
T2 - Not if, but How Much?
AU - Van Etten, Julia
AU - Bhattacharya, Debashish
N1 - Funding Information:
D.B. is supported by a research grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA; 80NSSC19K0462 ) and a National Institute of Food and Agriculture - US Department of Agriculture Hatch grant ( NJ01170 ). J.V.E. is supported by the NASA Future Investigators in NASA Earth and Space Science and Technology (FINESST grant 80NSSC19K1542 ). We are grateful to three anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on the manuscript.
Funding Information:
D.B. is supported by a research grant from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA; 80NSSC19K0462) and a National Institute of Food and Agriculture-US Department of Agriculture Hatch grant (NJ01170). J.V.E. is supported by the NASA Future Investigators in NASA Earth and Space Science and Technology (FINESST grant 80NSSC19K1542). We are grateful to three anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on the manuscript.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2020
PY - 2020/12
Y1 - 2020/12
N2 - Horizontal gene transfer (HGT), the movement of genetic material across branches of the tree of life, is well established in prokaryotes and uncontroversial. This is explained in part by relatively compact prokaryote genomes that facilitate assembly and gene prediction, resulting in thousands of complete genomes for analysis. By contrast, their large and often complex genome structure have thwarted HGT studies of eukaryotes. The tide has recently turned with the availability of sufficient high-quality genome data to address quantity and quality of HGT in these taxa. Here, we argue that HGT is a small but significant player in the evolution of microbial eukaryotes and provide examples where HGT has facilitated gain of adaptive functions and in some cases, underpinned major lifestyle transitions.
AB - Horizontal gene transfer (HGT), the movement of genetic material across branches of the tree of life, is well established in prokaryotes and uncontroversial. This is explained in part by relatively compact prokaryote genomes that facilitate assembly and gene prediction, resulting in thousands of complete genomes for analysis. By contrast, their large and often complex genome structure have thwarted HGT studies of eukaryotes. The tide has recently turned with the availability of sufficient high-quality genome data to address quantity and quality of HGT in these taxa. Here, we argue that HGT is a small but significant player in the evolution of microbial eukaryotes and provide examples where HGT has facilitated gain of adaptive functions and in some cases, underpinned major lifestyle transitions.
KW - functional validation
KW - horizontal gene transfer
KW - microbial eukaryote genome evolution
KW - phylogeny reconstruction
KW - tree of life
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U2 - 10.1016/j.tig.2020.08.006
DO - 10.1016/j.tig.2020.08.006
M3 - Review article
C2 - 33012528
AN - SCOPUS:85092203581
SN - 0168-9525
VL - 36
SP - 915
EP - 925
JO - Trends in Genetics
JF - Trends in Genetics
IS - 12
ER -