ArticleGenome research2009
Horizontal gene transfer of an entire metabolic pathway between a eukaryotic alga and its DNA virus.
Article in Genome research, 2009. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 75 papers.
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Who cites it
75 citing papers in PubMed, 179 citations in OpenAlex.
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- Ancient Host-Virus Gene Transfer Hints at a Diverse Pre-LECA Virosphere.Journal of molecular evolution · 2025Article
- Evolution of ubiquitin, cytoskeleton, and vesicular trafficking machinery in giant viruses.Journal of virology · 2025Article
- Co-infection of phylogenetically distinct nucleocytoviruses in Acanthamoeba castellanii cells.FEMS microbiology letters · 2025Article
- Viral niche-partitioning: comparative genomics of giant viruses across environmental gradients in a high Arctic freshwater-saltwater lake.ISME communications · 2025Article
- The GC% landscape of the Nucleocytoviricota.Brazilian journal of microbiology : [publication of the Brazilian Society for Microbiology] · 2024Article
- Genomic and biogeographic characterisation of the novel prasinovirus Mantoniella tinhauana virus 1.Environmental microbiology reports · 2024Article
- Gene Transfer Among Viruses Substantially Contributes to Gene Gain of Giant Viruses.Molecular biology and evolution · 2024Article
- DNA methylation enables recurrent endogenization of giant viruses in an animal relative.Science advances · 2024Article
- Automated classification of giant virus genomes using a random forest model built on trademark protein families.Npj viruses · 2024Article
- Algal blooms in the ocean: hot spots for chemically mediated microbial interactions.Nature reviews. Microbiology · 2024Review
- Cell-to-cell heterogeneity drives host-virus coexistence in a bloom-forming alga.The ISME journal · 2024Article
- Unexpected thermal stability of two enveloped megaviruses, Emiliania huxleyi virus and African swine fever virus, as measured by viability PCR.Virology journal · 2024Article
- Eukaryotic viruses encode the ribosomal protein eL40.Npj viruses · 2024Article
- Invited Review Beyond parasitic convergence: unravelling the evolution of the organellar genomes in holoparasites.Annals of botany · 2023Review
- Multicellularity and the Need for Communication-A Systematic Overview on (Algal) Plasmodesmata and Other Types of Symplasmic Cell Connections.Plants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Review
- Virologs, viral mimicry, and virocell metabolism: the expanding scale of cellular functions encoded in the complex genomes of giant viruses.FEMS microbiology reviews · 2023Article
- Functional Profiling and Evolutionary Analysis of a Marine Microalgal Virus Pangenome.Viruses · 2023Article
15 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
7 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Interactions between viruses and phytoplankton, the main primary producers in the oceans, affect global biogeochemical cycles and climate. Recent studies are increasingly revealing possible cases of gene transfers between cyanobacteria and phages, which might have played significant roles in the evolution of cyanobacteria/phage systems. However, little has been documented about the occurrence of horizontal gene transfer in eukaryotic phytoplankton/virus systems. Here we report phylogenetic evidence for the transfer of seven genes involved in the sphingolipid biosynthesis pathway between the cosmopolitan eukaryotic microalga Emiliania huxleyi and its large DNA virus EhV. PCR assays indicate that these genes are prevalent in E. huxleyi and EhV strains isolated from different geographic locations. Patterns of protein and gene sequence conservation support that these genes are functional in both E. huxleyi and EhV. This is the first clear case of horizontal gene transfer of multiple functionally linked enzymes in a eukaryotic phytoplankton-virus system. We examine arguments for the possible direction of the gene transfer. The virus-to-host direction suggests the existence of ancient viruses that controlled the complex metabolic pathway in order to infect primitive eukaryotic cells. In contrast, the host-to-virus direction suggests that the serial acquisition of genes involved in the same metabolic pathway might have been a strategy for the ancestor of EhVs to stay ahead of their closest relatives in the great evolutionary race for survival.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.