ArticleMolecular biology and evolution2022
Giant Starship Elements Mobilize Accessory Genes in Fungal Genomes.
Article in Molecular biology and evolution, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 69 papers.
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69 citing papers in PubMed, 114 citations in OpenAlex.
- Giant transposable elements drive genetic diversification iniScience · 2026Article
- Hybrid genome assembly of Penicillium oxalicum UV4 delineates cryptic secondary metabolite pathways and robust lignocellulolytic potential.Archives of microbiology · 2026Article
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- NOD-Like Receptor Genes Undergo Diversity-Enhancing Evolution in a Fungal Species Complex.Genome biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Accessory regions and horizontal gene transfer shape the evolution of clonal Colletotrichum nymphaeae infecting strawberry.The New phytologist · 2026Article
- Evolutionary innovation through fusion of sequences from across the tree of life.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Opportunistic pathogenicity in fungi can transcend species boundaries.bioRxiv : the preprint server for biology · 2026Article
- Complex multicellularity is linked with expanded specialized metabolite production in microorganisms.Nature microbiology · 2026Article
- A structurally unique effector shared between vascular wilt fungi drives cotton and olive defoliation.Nature communications · 2026Article
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- Regions of low gene expression promote maintenance and adaptation of horizontally acquired genes in yeasts.Communications biology · 2026Article
- Genome reshaping by Helitron transposons in Fusarium oxysporum TR4 affects secondary metabolism but not virulence.Nature communications · 2026Article
- Integrated Symbiotic Pleiotropy: Long Non-Coding RNAs and Disordered Proteins Interweaving the Functional Layers of the Eukaryotic Cell.International journal of molecular sciences · 2026Review
- Assembling telomere-to-telomere genomes of Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. lactucae provides a roadmap for studying genome and phenotype evolution.BMC genomics · 2026Article
- Intraspecific Variations and Characteristics of Clinical, Physiological, and Antifungal Susceptibility Profiles of Trichophyton rubrum in Southwest China.Mycopathologia · 2026Article
- Transposable elements hitchhike on Starships across fungal genomes.Nature communications · 2026Article
- The evolutionary genomics of meiotic drive.Molecular biology and evolution · 2026Article
- Gene duplication, horizontal gene transfer, and trait trade-offs drive evolution of postfire resource acquisition in pyrophilous fungi.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Spatial structure: shaping the ecology and evolution of microbial communities.FEMS microbiology reviews · 2026Review
- Temperature and genetic background drive mobilization of diverse transposable elements in a global human fungal pathogen.PLoS genetics · 2026Article
9 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
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Authors and funding
11 authors at 5 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Accessory genes are variably present among members of a species and are a reservoir of adaptive functions. In bacteria, differences in gene distributions among individuals largely result from mobile elements that acquire and disperse accessory genes as cargo. In contrast, the impact of cargo-carrying elements on eukaryotic evolution remains largely unknown. Here, we show that variation in genome content within multiple fungal species is facilitated by Starships, a newly discovered group of massive mobile elements that are 110 kb long on average, share conserved components, and carry diverse arrays of accessory genes. We identified hundreds of Starship-like regions across every major class of filamentous Ascomycetes, including 28 distinct Starships that range from 27 to 393 kb and last shared a common ancestor ca. 400 Ma. Using new long-read assemblies of the plant pathogen Macrophomina phaseolina, we characterize four additional Starships whose activities contribute to standing variation in genome structure and content. One of these elements, Voyager, inserts into 5S rDNA and contains a candidate virulence factor whose increasing copy number has contrasting associations with pathogenic and saprophytic growth, suggesting Voyager's activity underlies an ecological trade-off. We propose that Starships are eukaryotic analogs of bacterial integrative and conjugative elements based on parallels between their conserved components and may therefore represent the first dedicated agents of active gene transfer in eukaryotes. Our results suggest that Starships have shaped the content and structure of fungal genomes for millions of years and reveal a new concerted route for evolution throughout an entire eukaryotic phylum.
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