Lineage w monarch10/30/2023 Within the host’s gut, it reproduces first asexually then sexually as the host matures before forming dormant oocysts on the cuticle of the developing butterfly. It parasitizes butterfly species beginning when caterpillars ingest oocysts shed onto eggs and plant matter by infected adults. Ophryocystis elektroscirrha: a model non-model Apicomplexan parasite with open genetic questionsĪmong the invertebrate-infecting Apicomplexa, one of the best-studied is the neogregarine Ophryocystis elektroscirrha (Neogregarinorida: Ophryocystidae, McLaughlin and Myers 1970). However, with many unknowns about the genomics of apicomplexans that parasitize other vertebrates (see Levine 1986 for numerous examples) or invertebrates, the overall patterns of genome size, gene content, and conservation of these features are open questions. gondii to only 4,000 in the bovine parasite Theileria orientalis, a more than two-fold difference in gene content. Similarly, the gene content in these genomes is highly variable, from roughly 9,000 genes in T. Genomic studies of Apicomplexa have sequenced genomes that range from roughly 130 million bases on the high end to a mere 9 million bases in other words, all Apicomplexa have small genomes compared to metazoans, but their genome sizes vary by an order of magnitude at least. One of the most prominent examples of this limited and biased sampling is the Apicomplexa in the Kingdom Protista, a phylum of single-celled parasites including the organisms responsible for human diseases such as malaria, caused by Plasmodium spp., and toxoplasmosis, from infections with Toxoplasma gondii. ![]() When unicellular eukaryotes are studied, it is still mostly in connection to human health or economic interests. ![]() We show that Ophryocystis completely lacks Type II or Type 4 sodium pumps, and related proteins PMCA calcium pumps show extreme sequence divergence compared to other Apicomplexa, demonstrating new avenues of research opened by genome sequencing of non-model Apicomplexa.Įukaryotic genomics has overwhelmingly focused on multicellular organisms, in spite of the staggering diversity of unicellular eukaryotes. Monarch butterflies are well-known to tolerate toxic cardenolides thanks to changes in the sequence of their Type II ATPase sodium pumps. Using these two new genomes, we investigated potential evolutionary response by parasites to toxic phytochemicals their hosts ingest and sequester. elektroscirrha reference, possibly representing a distinct species. We recovered a similarly sized parasite genome from another butterfly, Danaus chrysippus, that was highly diverged from the O. Next, we show that sequencing data from other potential host butterflies can be used to diagnose infection status as well as to study diversity of parasite sequences. elektroscirrha shares different orthologs with each sequenced relative, suggesting the true set of universally conserved apicomplexan genes is very small indeed. To start, the genome is miniscule, totaling only 9 million bases and containing fewer than 3,000 genes, half the gene content of two other sequenced invertebrate-infecting apicomplexans, Porospora gigantea and Gregarina niphandrodes. We contextualize our newly generated resources within apicomplexan genomics before answering longstanding questions specific to this host-parasite system. ![]() To better understand the evolution and diversity of these single-celled eukaryotes, we sequenced the genome of Ophryocystis elektroscirrha, a parasite of monarch butterflies, Danaus plexippus. Apicomplexa are ancient and diverse organisms which have been poorly characterized by modern genomics.
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