Two different domains of the luciferase gene in the heterotrophic dinoflagellate Noctiluca scintillans occur as two separate genes in photosynthetic species

Abstract

EVOLUTIONCorrection for "Two different domains of the luciferase gene in the heterotrophic dinoflagellate Noctiluca scintillans occur as two separate genes in photosynthetic species," by Liyun Liu and J. Woodland Hastings, which appeared in issue 3, January 16, 2007, of Proc Natl Acad Sci USA (104:696-701; first published November 27, 2006; 10.1073/pnas.0607816103).The authors note that the data deposition footnote should instead appear as "Data deposition: The sequence reported in this paper has been deposited in the GenBank database (accession no. JF838193

Microalgae: Current Research and Applications

“…The complexity of the evolution of dinoflagellate bioluminescence system is highlighted by unique bioluminescence gene of N. scintillans (Liu & Hastings, 2007), a heterotrophic dinoflagellate which is ancestral to photosynthetic bioluminescent species. Its lcf consists of only one domain which is shorter than that of photosynthetic species and it is attached to lbp as a single hybrid gene (Figure 3).…”

“…Meanwhile, in the field, bioluminescence has been used to study ecological dynamics within the plankton and to monitor toxic blooms (Moline et al, 2009;Shulman et al, 2011;Le Tortorec et al, 2013). Studies on dinoflagellate bioluminescence have shed like on fundamental processes like cellular mechanotransduction (von Dassow & Latz, 2002;Chen et al, 2007;Jin et al, 2013), circadian rhythms (Hastings, 2009) and evolution of gene structure (Liu et al, 2004;Liu & Hastings, 2007). The molecular components of the reaction have been used as reporters in biomedical applications (Suzuki et al, 2005;Li et al, 2010) and whole cells have been used to visualize fluid flow (Rohr et al, 2002;Watanabe & Tanaka, 2011).…”

“…polyedrum occurs as a gene family with two distinct variants with approximately 86% identity (Lee et al, 1993;Machabée et al, 1994), each composed of 4 repeat domains with little similarity between them, unlike the homologous domains lcf (Liu & Hastings, 2007). Both variants are expressed at equal level (Machabée et al, 1994).…”

Molecular and biochemical basis for the loss of bioluminescence in the dinoflagellate Noctiluca scintillans along the west coast of the U.S.A.

“…This is likely to be the ancestral gene arrangement for dinoflagellates, since, according to phylotranscriptome analyses (Janouskovec et al 2017), N. scintillans represents a basal taxon among dinoflagellates, having a typical dinokaryotic nucleus only during the gamete life stage (Hansen et al 2004) and lacking mitochondrial mRNA editing that is typical of phylogenetically more recent species (Chang 1960;Sweeney 1963). It is thought that lcf/lbp split into two separate genes in more recent dinoflagellates (Liu and Hastings 2007;, potentially to allow for individual regulation of each protein (Valiadi and Iglesias-Rodriguez 2013).…”

“…The aim of this study was to investigate the molecular, cellular, and biochemical basis for the lack of bioluminescence in N. scintillans from the west coast of the U.S.A. This red form of N. scintillans differs from those of other regions by its smaller size (Eckert and Findlay 1962;Balch and Haxo 1984;Tada et al 2000;Liu and Hastings 2007) and lack of bioluminescence (Chang 1960;Esaias 1973;Dewey 1976;Sulkin et al 1998;Hoppenrath and Leander 2010). In comparison to a bioluminescent variety from the Gulf of Mexico, we assessed cell size, existence of scintillons, presence of luciferin and its derived metabolites and the presence, sequence, and expression of lcf/lbp.…”