Synopsis
Plants have the distinction of possessing the largest known mitochondrial genomes among eukaryotes although their size does not reflect a proportionate increase in gene content. Early-diverging lineages of land plants, such as liverworts and mosses, have mitochondrial genomes of approximately 100–200 kb with a conservative set of about 70 genes, some of which retain bacterial-operon organization reflecting their ancestry. In contrast, the mitochondrial genomes of vascular plants range from about 200 kb to almost 3,000 kb. They are highly recombinogenic and exist in multiple physical forms with varying stoichiometries. In addition, they have a mosaic composition due to the incorporation of “foreign” chloroplast and nuclear sequences, as well as exogenous DNA through horizontal transfer. Such sequences are acquired in a sporadic, lineage-specific fashion and this includes functional chloroplast-origin tRNA genes that have replaced certain native mitochondrial counterparts....
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Recommended Reading
Adams KL, Palmer JD (2003) Evolution of mitochondrial gene content: gene loss and transfer to the nucleus. Mol Phylogenet Evol 29:380–395
Alverson AJ, Rice DW, Dickinson S, Barry K, Palmer JD (2011) Origins and recombination of the bacterial-sized multichromosomal mitochondrial genome of cucumber. Plant Cell 23:2499–2513
Chaw SM, Shih AC, Wang D, Wu YW, Liu SM, Chou TY (2008) The mitochondrial genome of the gymnosperm Cycas taitungensis contains a novel family of short interspersed elements, Bpu sequences, and abundant RNA editing sites. Mol Biol Evol 25:603–615
Davila JI, Arrieta-Montiel MP, Wamboldt Y, Cao J, Hagmann J, Shedge V, Xu YZ, Weigel D, Mackenzie SA (2011) Double-strand break repair processes drive evolution of the mitochondrial genome in Arabidopsis. BMC Biol 9:64
Hecht J, Grewe F, Knoop V (2011) Extreme RNA editing in coding islands and abundant microsatellites in repeat sequences of Selaginella moellendorffii mitochondria: the root of frequent plant mtDNA recombination in early tracheophytes. Genome Biol 3:344–358
Kitazaki K, Kubo T (2010) Cost of having the largest mitochondrial genome: evolutionary mechanism of plant mitochondrial genome. J Bot 2010. Article ID 620137, 12 p. doi:10.1155/2010/620137
Knoop V (2004) The mitochondrial DNA of land plants: peculiarities in phylogenetic perspective. Curr Genet 46:123–139
Liu Y, Xue JY, Wang B, Li L, Qiu YL (2011) The mitochondrial genomes of the early land plants Treubia lacunosa and Anomodon rugelii: dynamic and conservative evolution. PLoS One 6:e25836
Oda K, Yamato K, Ohta E, Nakamura Y, Takemura M, Nozato N, Akashi K, Kanegae T, Ogura Y, Kohchi T, Ohyama K (1992) Gene organization deduced from the complete sequence of liverwort Marchantia polymorpha mitochondrial DNA: a primitive form of plant mitochondrial genome. J Mol Biol 223:1–7
Unseld M, Marienfeld JR, Brandt P, Brennicke A (1997) The mitochondrial genome of Arabidopsis thaliana contains 57 genes in 366,924 nucleotides. Nat Genet 15:57–61
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer Science+Business Media New York
About this entry
Cite this entry
Bonen, L. (2014). Mitochondrial Genomes in Land Plants. In: Bell, E. (eds) Molecular Life Sciences. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-6436-5_182-2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-6436-5_182-2
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Online ISBN: 978-1-4614-6436-5
eBook Packages: Springer Reference Biomedicine and Life SciencesReference Module Biomedical and Life Sciences