Skip to main content

Advertisement

Log in

Group-specific functional patterns of mitochondrion-related organelles shed light on their multiple transitions from mitochondria in ciliated protists

  • Research Paper
  • Published:
Marine Life Science & Technology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Adaptations of ciliates to hypoxic environments have arisen independently several times. Studies on mitochondrion-related organelle (MRO) metabolisms from distinct anaerobic ciliate groups provide evidence for understanding the transitions from mitochondria to MROs within eukaryotes. To deepen our knowledge about the evolutionary patterns of ciliate anaerobiosis, mass-culture and single-cell transcriptomes of two anaerobic species, Metopus laminarius (class Armophorea) and Plagiopyla cf. narasimhamurtii (class Plagiopylea), were sequenced and their MRO metabolic maps were compared. In addition, we carried out comparisons using publicly available predicted MRO proteomes from other ciliate classes (i.e., Armophorea, Litostomatea, Muranotrichea, Oligohymenophorea, Parablepharismea and Plagiopylea). We found that single-cell transcriptomes were similarly comparable to their mass-culture counterparts in predicting MRO metabolic pathways of ciliates. The patterns of the components of the MRO metabolic pathways might be divergent among anaerobic ciliates, even among closely related species. Notably, our findings indicate the existence of group-specific functional relics of electron transport chains (ETCs). Detailed group-specific ETC functional patterns are as follows: full oxidative phosphorylation in Oligohymenophorea and Muranotrichea; only electron-transfer machinery in Armophorea; either of these functional types in Parablepharismea; and ETC functional absence in Litostomatea and Plagiopylea. These findings suggest that adaptation of ciliates to anaerobic conditions is group-specific and has occurred multiple times. Our results also show the potential and the limitations of detecting ciliate MRO proteins using single-cell transcriptomes and improve the understanding of the multiple transitions from mitochondria to MROs within ciliates.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5

Similar content being viewed by others

Data availability

The 18S rDNA sequences were submitted into GenBank (accession numbers are SAMN29232525 for Metopus laminarius and SAMN29232526 for Plagiopyla cf. narasimhamurtii). And the single-cell transcriptomes and mass-culture transcriptomes of two species were submitted to GenBank under BioProject ID PRJNA851543.

References

  • Arregui L, Pérez-Uz B, Zornoza A, Serrano S (2010) A new species of the genus Metacystis (Ciliophora, Prostomatida, Metacystidae) from a wastewater treatment plant. J Eukaryot Microbiol 57:362–368

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Beinart RA, Beaudoin DJ, Bernhard JM, Edgcomb VP (2018a) Insights into the metabolic functioning of a multipartner ciliate symbiosis from oxygen-depleted sediments. Mol Ecol 27:1794–1807

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Beinart RA, Rotterová J, Čepička I, Gast RJ, Edgcomb VP (2018b) The genome of an endosymbiotic methanogen is very similar to those of its free-living relatives. Environ Microbiol 20:2538–2551

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Berger J, Lynn DH (1992) Hydrogenosome-methanogen assemblages in the echinoid endocommensal plagiopylid ciliates, Lechriopyla mystax Lynch, 1930 and Plagiopyla minuta Powers, 1933. J Protozool 39:4–8

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bernard C, Fenchel T (1996) Some microaerobic ciliates are facultative anaerobes. Eur J Protistol 32:293–297

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bolger AM, Lohse M, Usadel B (2014) Trimmomatic: a flexible trimmer for Illumina sequence data. Bioinformatics 30:2114–2120

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Bourland WA, Wendell L, Hampikian G (2014) Morphologic and molecular description of Metopus fuscus Kahl from North America and new rDNA sequences from seven metopids (Armophorea, Metopidae). Eur J Protistol 50:213–230

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Camacho C, Coulouris G, Avagyan V, Ma N, Papadopoulos J, Bealer K, Madden TL (2009) BLAST+: architecture and applications. BMC Bioinform 10:421

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Campello-Nunes PH, Silva-Neto ID, Sales MHO, Soares CAG, Paiva TS, Fernandes NM (2022) Morphological and phylogenetic investigations shed light on evolutionary relationships of the enigmatic genus Copemetopus (Ciliophora, Alveolata), with the proposal of Copemetopus verae sp. Nov. Eur J Protistol 83:125878

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Chen X, Gao S, Liu Y, Wang Y, Wang Y, Song W (2016) Enzymatic and chemical mapping of nucleosome distribution in purified micro- and macro-nuclei of the ciliated model organism, Tetrahymena thermophila. Sci China Life Sci 59:909–919

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Chen X, Wang C, Pan B, Lu B, Li C, Shen Z, Warren A, Li L (2020) Single-cell genomic sequencing of three peritrichs (Protista, Ciliophora) reveals less biased stop codon usage and more prevalent programmed ribosomal frameshifting than in other ciliates. Front Mar Sci 7:602323

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Clarke KJ, Finlay BJ, Esteban G, Guhl BE, Embley TM (1993) Cyclidium porcatum n. sp.: a free-living anaerobic scuticociliate containing a stable complex of hydrogenosomes, eubacteria and archaeobacteria. Eur J Protistol 29:262–270

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Claros MG, Vincens P (1996) Computational method to predict mitochondrially imported proteins and their targeting sequences. Eur J Biochem 241:779–786

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Cuthill IC, Stevens M, Sheppard J, Maddocks T, Parraga CA, Troscianko TS (2005) Disruptive coloration and background pattern matching. Nature 434:72–74

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • de Graaf RM, Ricard G, van Alen TA, Duarte I, Dutilh BE, Burgtorf C, Kuiper JW, van der Staay GW, Tielens AG, Huynen MA, Hackstein JH (2011) The organellar genome and metabolic potential of the hydrogen-producing mitochondrion of Nyctotherus ovalis. Mol Biol Evol 28:2379–2391

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Dolezal P, Dancis A, Lesuisse E, Sutak R, Hrdy I, Embley TM, Tachezy J (2007) Frataxin, a conserved mitochondrial protein, in the hydrogenosome of Trichomonas vaginalis. Eukaryot Cell 6:1431–1438

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Duan L, Cheng T, Wei F, Qiao Y, Wang C, Warren A, Niu J, Wang Y (2021) New contribution to epigenetic studies: isolation of micronuclei with high purity and DNA integrity in the model ciliated protist, Tetrahymena thermophila. Eur J Protistol 80:125804

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Ebenezer TE, Zoltner M, Burrell A, Nenarokova A, Novak Vanclova AMG, Prasad B, Soukal P, Santana-Molina C, O'Neill E, Nankissoor NN, Vadakedath N, Daiker V, Obado S, Silva-Pereira S, Jackson AP, Devos DP, Lukes J, Lebert M, Vaughan S, Hampl V et al (2019) Transcriptome, proteome and draft genome of Euglena gracilis. BMC Biol 17:11

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Edgcomb VP, Pachiadaki M (2014) Ciliates along oxyclines of permanently stratified marine water columns. J Eukaryot Microbiol 61:434–445

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Emanuelsson O, Brunak S, von Heijne G, Nielsen H (2007) Locating proteins in the cell using TargetP, SignalP and related tools. Nat Protoc 2:953–971

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Embley TM, Finlay BJ, Dyal PL, Hirt RP, Wilkinson M, Williams AG (1995) Multiple origins of anaerobic ciliates with hydrogenosomes within the radiation of aerobic ciliates. Proc Biol Sci 262:87–93

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Esteban G, Fenchel T, Finlay B (1995) Diversity of free-living morphospecies in the ciliate genus Metopus. Arch Protistenk 146:137–164

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fenchel T, Finlay BJ (1991) The biology of free-living anaerobic ciliates. Eur J Protistol 26:201–215

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Fenchel T, Perry T, Thane A (1977) Anaerobiosis and symbiosis with bacteria in free-living ciliates. J Protozool 24:154–163

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Feng JM, Jiang CQ, Sun ZY, Hua CJ, Wen JF, Miao W, Xiong J (2020) Single-cell transcriptome sequencing of rumen ciliates provides insight into their molecular adaptations to the anaerobic and carbohydrate-rich rumen microenvironment. Mol Phylogenet Evol 143:106687

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Fernandes NM, Vizzoni VF, Borges BDN, Soares CAG, da Silva-Neto ID, Paiva TDS (2018) Molecular phylogeny and comparative morphology indicate that odontostomatids (Alveolata, Ciliophora) form a distinct class-level taxon related to Armophorea. Mol Phylogenet Evol 126:382–389

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Finlay BJ, Fenchel T, Gardener S (1986) Oxygen perception and O2 toxicity in the freshwater ciliated protozoon Loxodes. J Protozool 33:157–165

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Finlay BJ, Tellez C, Esteban GF (1993) Diversity of free-living ciliates in the sandy sediment of a Spanish stream in winter. J Eukaryot Microbiol 139:2855–2863

    Google Scholar 

  • Foissner W, Foissner I (1995) Fine structure and systematic position of Enchelyomorpha vermicularis (Smith, 1899) Kahl, 1930, an anaerobic ciliate (Protozoa, Ciliophora) from from domestic sewage. Acta Protozool 34:21–34

    Google Scholar 

  • Fukasawa Y, Tsuji J, Fu SC, Tomii K, Horton P, Imai K (2015) MitoFates: improved prediction of mitochondrial targeting sequences and their cleavage sites. Mol Cell Proteomics 14:1113–1126

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Gao F, Warren A, Zhang Q, Gong J, Miao M, Sun P, Xu D, Huang J, Yi Z, Song W (2016) The all-data-based evolutionary hypothesis of ciliated protists with a revised classification of the phylum Ciliophora (Eukaryota, Alveolata). Sci Rep 6:24874

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Gawryluk RMR, Stairs CW (2021) Diversity of electron transport chains in anaerobic protists. BBA-Bioenergetics 1862:148334

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Gawryluk RMR, Kamikawa R, Stairs CW, Silberman JD, Brown MW, Roger AJ (2016) The earliest stages of mitochondrial adaptation to low oxygen revealed in a novel rhizarian. Curr Biol 26:2729–2738

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Gong J, Stoeck T, Yi Z, Miao M, Zhang Q, Roberts DM, Warren A, Song W (2009) Small subunit rRNA phylogenies show that the class Nassophorea is not monophyletic (phylum Ciliophora). J Eukaryot Microbiol 56:339–347

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Gouy M, Guindon S, Gascuel O (2010) SeaView version 4: a multiplatform graphical user interface for sequence alignment and phylogenetic tree building. Mol Biol Evol 27:221–224

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Grabherr MG, Haas BJ, Yassour M, Levin JZ, Thompson DA, Amit I, Adiconis X, Fan L, Raychowdhury R, Zeng Q, Chen Z, Mauceli E, Hacohen N, Gnirke A, Rhind N, di Palma F, Birren BW, Nusbaum C, Lindblad-Toh K, Friedman N et al (2011) Full-length transcriptome assembly from RNA-Seq data without a reference genome. Nat Biotechnol 29:644–652

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Haas BJ, Papanicolaou A, Yassour M, Grabherr M, Blood PD, Bowden J, Couger MB, Eccles D, Li B, Lieber M, MacManes MD, Ott M, Orvis J, Pochet N, Strozzi F, Weeks N, Westerman R, William T, Dewey CN, Henschel R et al (2013) De novo transcript sequence reconstruction from RNA-seq using the Trinity platform for reference generation and analysis. Nat Protoc 8:1494–1512

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hackstein JHP (2018) (Endo)symbiotic methanogenic archaea. Springer, Berlin

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Hines HN, Onsbring H, Ettema TJG, Esteban GF (2018) Molecular investigation of the ciliate Spirostomum semivirescens, with first transcriptome and new geographical records. Protist 169:875–886

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hu X (2014) Ciliates in extreme environments. J Eukaryot Microbiol 61:410–418

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hug LA, Stechmann A, Roger AJ (2010) Phylogenetic distributions and histories of proteins involved in anaerobic pyruvate metabolism in eukaryotes. Mol Biol Evol 27:311–324

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Hyatt D, Chen GL, Locascio PF, Land ML, Larimer FW, Hauser LJ (2010) Prodigal: prokaryotic gene recognition and translation initiation site identification. BMC Bioinform 11:119

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Islam S, Zeisel A, Joost S, La Manno G, Zajac P, Kasper M, Lonnerberg P, Linnarsson S (2014) Quantitative single-cell RNA-seq with unique molecular identifiers. Nat Methods 11:163–166

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Jiang L, Wang C, Zhuang W, Li S, Hu X (2021a) Taxonomy, phylogeny, and geographical distribution of the little-known Helicoprorodon multinucleatum Dragesco, 1960 (Ciliophora, Haptorida) and key to species within the genus. Eur J Protistol 78:125769

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Jiang L, Zhuang W, El-Serehy HA, Al-Farraj SA, Warren A, Hu X (2021b) Taxonomy and molecular phylogeny of two new species of prostomatean ciliates with establishment of Foissnerophrys gen. n. (Alveolata, Ciliophora). Front Microbiol 12:686929

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Kahl A (1927) Neue und ergänzende Beobachtungen heterotricher Ciliaten. Arch Protistenk 57:121–203

    Google Scholar 

  • Kofoid CA (1943) On the type of the genus Diplodinium Schuberg, 1888 (class Ciliophora). Bull Zool Nomencl 1:167

    PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Kolisko M, Boscaro V, Burki F, Lynn DH, Keeling PJ (2014) Single-cell transcriptomics for microbial eukaryotes. Curr Biol 24:R1081–R1082

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Langmead B, Salzberg SL (2012) Fast gapped-read alignment with Bowtie 2. Nat Methods 9:357–359

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Larsson A (2014) AliView: a fast and lightweight alignment viewer and editor for large datasets. Bioinformatics 30:3276–3278

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Leger MM, Eme L, Hug LA, Roger AJ (2016) Novel hydrogenosomes in the microaerophilic jakobid Stygiella incarcerata. Mol Biol Evol 33:2318–2336

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Lewis WH, Lind AE, Sendra KM, Onsbring H, Williams TA, Esteban GF, Hirt RP, Ettema TJG, Embley TM (2019) Convergent evolution of hydrogenosomes from mitochondria by gene transfer and loss. Mol Biol Evol 37:524–539

    Article  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Li B, Dewey CN (2011) RSEM: accurate transcript quantification from RNA-Seq data with or without a reference genome. BMC Bioinform 12:323

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Li M, Hu G, Li C, Zhao WS, Zou H, Li WX, Wu SG, Wang GT, Ponce-Gordo F (2020) Morphological and molecular characterization of a new ciliate Nyctotheroides grimi n. sp. (Armophorea, Clevelandellida) from Chinese frogs. Acta Trop 208:105531

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Li R, Zhuang W, Wang C, El-Serehy H, Al-Farraj SA, Warren A, Hu X (2021a) Redescription and SSU rRNA gene-based phylogeny of an anaerobic ciliate, Plagiopyla ovata Kahl, 1931 (Ciliophora, Plagiopylea). Int J Syst Evol Micr 71:004936

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Li S, Zhuang W, Pérez-Uz B, Zhang Q, Hu X (2021b) Two anaerobic ciliates (Ciliophora, Armophorea) from China: morphology and SSU rDNA sequence, with report of a new species, Metopus paravestitus nov. spec. J Eukaryot Microbiol 68:e12822

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Liu Z, Hu SK, Campbell V, Tatters AO, Heidelberg KB, Caron DA (2017) Single-cell transcriptomics of small microbial eukaryotes: limitations and potential. ISME J 11:1282–1285

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Losey NA, Poudel S, Boyd ES, McInerney MJ (2020) The beta subunit of non-bifurcating NADH-dependent [FeFe]-Hydrogenases differs from those of multimeric electron-bifurcating [FeFe]-Hydrogenases. Front Microbiol 11:1109

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Lynn DH (2008) The ciliated protozoa: characterization, classification, and guide to the literature. Springer, Berlin

    Google Scholar 

  • Marinov GK, Williams BA, McCue K, Schroth GP, Gertz J, Myers RM, Wold BJ (2014) From single-cell to cell-pool transcriptomes: stochasticity in gene expression and RNA splicing. Genome Res 24:496–510

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Mortazavi A, Williams BA, McCue K, Schaeffer L, Wold B (2008) Mapping and quantifying mammalian transcriptomes by RNA-Seq. Nat Methods 5:621–628

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Müller M, Mentel M, van Hellemond JJ, Henze K, Woehle C, Gould SB, Yu RY, van der Giezen M, Tielens AG, Martin WF (2012) Biochemistry and evolution of anaerobic energy metabolism in eukaryotes. Microbiol Mol Biol R 76:444–495

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Narayanan N, Priya M, Haridas A, Manilal VB (2007) Isolation and culturing of a most common anaerobic ciliate, Metopus sp. Anaerobe 13:14–20

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Nguyen VH, Lavenier D (2009) PLAST: parallel local alignment search tool for database comparison. BMC Bioinform 10:329

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nitla V, Serra V, Fokin S, Modeo L, Verni F, Sandeep B, Kalavati C, Petroni G (2019) Critical revision of the family Plagiopylidae (Ciliophora: Plagiopylea), including the description of two novel species, Plagiopyla ramani and Plagiopyla narasimhamurtii, and redescription of Plagiopyla nasuta Stein, 1860 from India. Zool J Linn Soc-Lond 186:1–45

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Orsi W, Edgcomb V, Faria J, Foissner W, Fowle WH, Hohmann T, Suarez P, Taylor C, Taylor GT, Vd’ačný P, Epstein SS (2012) Class Cariacotrichea, a novel ciliate taxon from the anoxic Cariaco Basin, Venezuela. Int J Syst Evol Microbiol 62:1425–1433

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Pan B, Chen X, Hou L, Zhang Q, Qu Z, Warren A, Miao M (2019) Comparative genomics analysis of ciliates Provides insights on the evolutionary history within “Nassophorea-Synhymenia-Phyllopharyngea” assemblage. Front Microbiol 10:2819

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Park T, Wijeratne S, Meulia T, Firkins JL, Yu Z (2021) The macronuclear genome of anaerobic ciliate Entodinium caudatum reveals its biological features adapted to the distinct rumen environment. Genomics 113:1416–1427

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Ricard G, McEwan NR, Dutilh BE, Jouany JP, Macheboeuf D, Mitsumori M, McIntosh FM, Michalowski T, Nagamine T, Nelson N, Newbold CJ, Nsabimana E, Takenaka A, Thomas NA, Ushida K, Hackstein JH, Huynen MA (2006) Horizontal gene transfer from bacteria to rumen ciliates indicates adaptation to their anaerobic, carbohydrates-rich environment. BMC Genomics 7:22

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Rotterová J, Salomaki E, Pánek T, Bourland W, Žihala D, Táborský P, Edgcomb VP, Beinart RA, Kolísko M, Čepička I (2020) Genomics of new ciliate lineages provides insight into the evolution of obligate anaerobiosis. Curr Biol 30:1–14

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rotterová J, Edgcomb VP, Čepička I, Beinart R (2022) Anaerobic ciliates as a model group for studying symbioses in oxygen-depleted environments. J Eukaryot Microbiol 24:e12912

    Google Scholar 

  • Sela I, Ashkenazy H, Katoh K, Pupko T (2015) GUIDANCE2: accurate detection of unreliable alignment regions accounting for the uncertainty of multiple parameters. Nucleic Acids Res 43:W7-14

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Sheng Y, He M, Zhao F, Shao C, Miao M (2018) Phylogenetic relationship analyses of complicated class Spirotrichea based on transcriptomes from three diverse microbial eukaryotes: Uroleptopsis citrina, Euplotes vannus and Protocruzia tuzeti. Mol Phylogenet Evol 129:338–345

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Smith DG, Gawryluk RM, Spencer DF, Pearlman RE, Siu KW, Gray MW (2007) Exploring the mitochondrial proteome of the ciliate protozoon Tetrahymena thermophila: direct analysis by tandem mass spectrometry. J Mol Biol 374:837–863

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Stairs CW, Eme L, Brown MW, Mutsaers C, Susko E, Dellaire G, Soanes DM, van der Giezen M, Roger AJ (2014) A SUF Fe-S cluster biogenesis system in the mitochondrion-related organelles of the anaerobic protist Pygsuia. Curr Biol 24:1176–1186

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Stairs CW, Leger MM, Roger AJ (2015) Diversity and origins of anaerobic metabolism in mitochondria and related organelles. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 370:20140326

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Taniguchi Y, Choi PJ, Li GW, Chen H, Babu M, Hearn J, Emili A, Xie XS (2010) Quantifying E. coli proteome and transcriptome with single-molecule sensitivity in single cells. Science 329:533–538

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Trifinopoulos J, Nguyen LT, von Haeseler A, Minh BQ (2016) W-IQ-TREE: a fast online phylogenetic tool for maximum likelihood analysis. Nucleic Acids Res 44:W232-235

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Vďačný P, Orsi W, Bourland WA, Shimano S, Epstein SS, Foissner W (2011) Morphological and molecular phylogeny of dileptid and tracheliid ciliates: resolution at the base of the class Litostomatea (Ciliophora, Rhynchostomatia). Eur J Protistol 47:295–313

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Vďačný P, Rajter Ľ, Stoeck T, Foissner W (2019) A proposed timescale for the evolution of armophorean ciliates: clevelandellids diversify more rapidly than metopids. J Eukaryot Microbiol 66:167–181

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Wang G, Wang S, Chai X, Zhang J, Yang W, Jiang C, Chen K, Miao W, Xiong J (2021a) A strategy for complete telomere-to-telomere assembly of ciliate macronuclear genome using ultra-high coverage Nanopore data. Comput Struct Biotechnol J 19:1928–1932

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Wang J, Zhang T, Li F, Warren A, Li Y, Shao C (2021b) A new hypotrich ciliate, Oxytricha xianica sp. nov., with notes on the morphology and phylogeny of a Chinese population of Oxytricha auripunctata Blatterer & Foissner, 1988 (Ciliophora, Oxytrichidae). Mar Life Sci Technol 3:303–312

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  • Wu T, Li Y, Lu B, Shen Z, Song W, Warren A (2020) Morphology, taxonomy and molecular phylogeny of three marine peritrich ciliates, including two new species: Zoothamnium apoarbuscula n. sp. and Z. apohentscheli n. sp. (Protozoa, Ciliophora, Peritrichia). Mar Life Sci Technol 2:334–348

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Xu Y, Shen Z, Gentekaki E, Xu J, Yi Z (2020) Comparative transcriptome analyses during the vegetative cell cycle in the mono-cellular organism Pseudokeronopsis erythrina (Alveolata, Ciliophora). Microorganisms 8:108

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Yan Y, Maurer-Alcala XX, Knight R, Kosakovsky Pond SL, Katz LA (2019) Single-cell transcriptomics reveal a correlation between genome architecture and gene family evolution in ciliates. Mbio 10:e02524-19

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Zhang T, Li C, Zhang X, Wang C, Roger AJ, Gao F (2021) Characterization and comparative analyses of mitochondrial genomes in single-celled eukaryotes to shed light on the diversity and evolution of linear molecular architecture. Int J Mol Sci 22:2546

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  • Zhu C, Liu W, Li X, Xu Y, El-Serehy HA, Al-Farraj SA, Ma H, Stoeck T, Yi Z (2021) High salinity gradients and intermediate spatial scales shaped similar biogeographical and co-occurrence patterns of microeukaryotes in a tropical freshwater-saltwater ecosystem. Environ Microbiol 23:4778–4796

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  • Zhuang W, Li S, Bai Y, Zhang T, Al-Rasheid KAS, Hu X (2021) Morphology and molecular phylogeny of the anaerobic freshwater ciliate Urostomides spinosus nov. spec. (Ciliophora, Armophorea, Metopida) from China. Eur J Protistol 81:125823

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Dr. Alan Warren in Natural History Museum, UK for English improvement. Many thanks to Dr. Zhuo Shen in Sun Yat-sen University, China, for her help in species identification. Also, we thank Prof. Weibo Song in Ocean University of China, Dr. Lei Wu, Ms. Jiahui Xu, Ms. Zijing Quan, and Mr. Jian Wang in South China Normal University, for improving figures. This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Number 32070406), Guangdong Basic and Applied Basic Research Foundation (Grant Number 2022A1515010773), and the Science and Technology Planning Project of Guangzhou (Grant Number 202102080168).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Contributions

ZY designed the experiments. ZC, JL, and MC completed the experiments. ZY and DS directed data analysis. ZC, JL, MC, SC, SL, and YW analyzed the data. ZC and JL drafted the manuscript. DS and ZY revised the manuscript. All authors edited and approved the final manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Zhenzhen Yi.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Animal and human rights statement

This article does not contain human participants or animals.

Additional information

Edited by Jiamei Li.

Special topic: Ciliatology.

Supplementary Information

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Chen, Z., Li, J., Salas-Leiva, D.E. et al. Group-specific functional patterns of mitochondrion-related organelles shed light on their multiple transitions from mitochondria in ciliated protists. Mar Life Sci Technol 4, 609–623 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42995-022-00147-w

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s42995-022-00147-w

Keywords

Navigation