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Figure 1 | BMC Evolutionary Biology

Figure 1

From: A unique horizontal gene transfer event has provided the octocoral mitochondrial genome with an active mismatch repair gene that has potential for an unusual self-contained function

Figure 1

Hypotheses of mtMutS origins. Three previously-proposed hypotheses concerning the proximate origins of octocoral mtMutS. (A) mtMutS originated as a nuclear MSH gene and was subsequently transferred to the mitochondrial genome in octocorals [15]; (B) mtMutS entered the ancestral eukaryotic cell via endosymbiosis of the mitochondrion-like bacterial ancestor, and was subsequently transferred to the nucleus as MSH and lost from the mitochondrion of all other eukaryotes [18]; (C) Although both involved a bacterial MutS precursor, mtMutS was acquired by the ancestral octocoral mitochondrion independent of the means by which eukaryotic nuclei acquired MSH [32].

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BMC Ecology and Evolution

ISSN: 2730-7182

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