ArticleThe ISME journal2020
Unlinked rRNA genes are widespread among bacteria and archaea.
Article in The ISME journal, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 32 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
32 citing papers in PubMed, 48 citations in OpenAlex.
- Species- and strain-level assessment usingGut microbesTrial
- Comparison of a long-read amplicon sequencing approach to short-read amplicons for microbiome analysis.Microbiology spectrum · 2026Article
- Ribosome Heterogeneity in Plants: The Causes of This Phenomenon and Its Implications on Gene Expression.Plants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Complete genome dataset ofData in brief · 2026Article
- MIrROR release 02: Expanded and refined 16S-ITS-23S rRNA operon dataset.Scientific data · 2026Article
- Circularization of 23S rRNA but not 16S rRNA within archaeal ribosomes.Genome biology · 2026Article
- Tundrisphaera macrotermitis sp. nov., a novel member of the family Isosphaeraceae isolated from the gut of a fungus-growing termite.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Comparison of a long-read amplicon sequencing approach to short-read amplicons for microbiome analysis.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2025Article
- Article
- Adaptive traits ofmBio · 2024Article
- Ribosome Structural Changes Dynamically Affect Ribosome Function.International journal of molecular sciences · 2024Review
- GROND: a quality-checked and publicly available database of full-length 16S-ITS-23S rRNA operon sequences.Microbial genomics · 2024Article
- The Dynamic Interplay Between Ribosomal DNA and Transposable Elements: A Perspective From Genomics and Cytogenetics.Molecular biology and evolution · 2024Article
- RESCUE: a validated Nanopore pipeline to classify bacteria through long-read, 16S-ITS-23S rRNA sequencing.Frontiers in microbiology · 2023Article
- Ribosomal RNA operons define a central functional compartment in the Streptomyces chromosome.Nucleic acids research · 2022Article
- The Application of Metagenomics to Study Microbial Communities and Develop Desirable Traits in Fermented Foods.Foods (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Review
- High-resolution phylogenetic and population genetic analysis of microbial communities with RoC-ITS.ISME communications · 2022Article
- Microbial Identification Using rRNA Operon Region: Database and Tool for Metataxonomics with Long-Read Sequence.Microbiology spectrum · 2022Article
- Looking through the Lens of the Ribosome Biogenesis Evolutionary History: Possible Implications for Archaeal Phylogeny and Eukaryogenesis.Molecular biology and evolution · 2022Article
- A Comparative Perspective on Ribosome Biogenesis: Unity and Diversity Across the Tree of Life.Methods in molecular biology (Clifton, N.J.) · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 4 institutions in 5 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Ribosomes are essential to cellular life and the genes for their RNA components are the most conserved and transcribed genes in bacteria and archaea. Ribosomal RNA genes are typically organized into a single operon, an arrangement thought to facilitate gene regulation. In reality, some bacteria and archaea do not share this canonical rRNA arrangement-their 16S and 23S rRNA genes are separated across the genome and referred to as "unlinked". This rearrangement has previously been treated as an anomaly or a byproduct of genome degradation in intracellular bacteria. Here, we leverage complete genome and long-read metagenomic data to show that unlinked 16S and 23S rRNA genes are more common than previously thought. Unlinked rRNA genes occur in many phyla, most significantly within Deinococcus-Thermus, Chloroflexi, and Planctomycetes, and occur in differential frequencies across natural environments. We found that up to 41% of rRNA genes in soil were unlinked, in contrast to the human gut, where all sequenced rRNA genes were linked. The frequency of unlinked rRNA genes may reflect meaningful life history traits, as they tend to be associated with a mix of slow-growing free-living species and intracellular species. We speculate that unlinked rRNA genes may confer selective advantages in some environments, though the specific nature of these advantages remains undetermined and worthy of further investigation. More generally, the prevalence of unlinked rRNA genes in poorly-studied taxa serves as a reminder that paradigms derived from model organisms do not necessarily extend to the broader diversity of bacteria and archaea.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
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.