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Origin and evolution of alginate-c5-mannuronan-epimerase gene based on transcriptomic analysis of brown algae

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Abstract

The coding product of alginate-c5-mannuronan-epimerase gene (algG gene) can catalyze the conversion of mannuronate to guluronate and determine the M/G ratio of alginate. Most of the current knowledge about genes involved in the alginate biosynthesis comes from bacterial systems. In this article, based on some algal and bacterial algG genes registered on GenBank and EMBL databases, we predicted 94 algG genes open reading frame (ORF) sequences of brown algae from the 1 000 Plant Transcriptome Sequencing Project (OneKP). By method of transcriptomic sequence analysis, gene structure and gene localization analysis, multiple sequence alignment and phylogenetic tree construction, we studied the algal algG gene family characteristics, the structure modeling and conserved motifs of AlgG protein, the origin of alginate biosynthesis and the variation incidents that might have happened during evolution in algae. Although there are different members in the algal algG gene family, almost all of them harbor the conserved epimerase region. Based on the phylogenetic analysis of algG genes, we proposed that brown algae acquired the alginate biosynthesis pathway from an ancient bacterium by horizontal gene transfer (HGT). Afterwards, followed by duplications, chromosome disorder, mutation or recombination during evolution, brown algal algG genes were divided into different types.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Marine Life Science, Ocean University of China, Qingdao, 266003, China

    Ren Wang, Yalan Zhang, Tao Liu & Shan Chi

  2. CAS Key Laboratory of Genome Sciences and Information, Beijing Key Laboratory of Genome and Precision Medicine Technologies, Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China

    Xumin Wang & Jun Yu

  3. Beijing Key Laboratory of Functional Genomics for Dao-di Herbs, Beijing Institute of Genomics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China

    Xumin Wang & Jun Yu

  4. Guangdong Province Key Laboratory of Functional Molecules in Oceanic Microorganism, Zhong Shan School of Medicine, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, 510080, China

    Shengping Chen

Authors
  1. Ren Wang
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  2. Xumin Wang
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  3. Yalan Zhang
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  4. Jun Yu
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  5. Tao Liu
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  6. Shengping Chen
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  7. Shan Chi
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Correspondence to Tao Liu or Shan Chi.

Additional information

Foundation item: The National High Technology Research and Development Program of China under contract No. 2012AA10A406; the National Natural Science Foundation of China under contract Nos 41206116, 31140070 and 31271397; Technology Project of Ocean and Fisheries of Guangdong Province under contract No. A201201E03; the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities under contract No. 201262003; China Postdoctoral Science Foundation under contract No. 2011M501167; the algal transcriptome sequencing was supported by 1KP Project (www.onekp.com).

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Wang, R., Wang, X., Zhang, Y. et al. Origin and evolution of alginate-c5-mannuronan-epimerase gene based on transcriptomic analysis of brown algae. Acta Oceanol. Sin. 33, 73–85 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-014-0443-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13131-014-0443-4

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