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An intact plastid genome is essential for the survival of colorless Euglena longa but not Euglena gracilis

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Abstract

Euglena gracilis growth with antibacterial agents leads to bleaching, permanent plastid gene loss. Colorless Euglena (Astasia) longa resembles a bleached E. gracilis. To evaluate the role of bleaching in E. longa evolution, the effect of streptomycin, a plastid protein synthesis inhibitor, and ofloxacin, a plastid DNA gyrase inhibitor, on E. gracilis and E. longa growth and plastid DNA content were compared. E. gracilis growth was unaffected by streptomycin and ofloxacin. Quantitative PCR analyses revealed a time dependent loss of plastid genes in E. gracilis demonstrating that bleaching agents produce plastid gene deletions without affecting cell growth. Streptomycin and ofloxacin inhibited E. longa growth indicating that it requires plastid genes to survive. This suggests that evolutionary divergence of E. longa from E. gracilis was triggered by the loss of a cytoplasmic metabolic activity also occurring in the plastid. Plastid metabolism has become obligatory for E. longa cell growth. A process termed “intermittent bleaching”, short term exposure to subsaturating concentrations of reversible bleaching agents followed by growth in the absence of a bleaching agent, is proposed as the molecular mechanism for E. longa plastid genome reduction. Various non-photosynthetic lineages could have independently arisen from their photosynthetic ancestors via a similar process.

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Abbreviations

SM:

Streptomycin

OF:

Ofloxacin

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Acknowledgments

Culture of Euglena (Astasia) longa was a kind gift of Prof. W. Hachtel (Bonn, Germany). We also thank to Dr. Martina Neboháčová (Department of Biochemistry, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University in Bratislava) for help with quantitative PCR. This work was supported by National Science Foundation grant MCB-0080345 to S. D. S. and Grants VEGA 1/0416/09, 1/0626/13 and NSF/MCB9630817/2000 from the Ministry of Education of the Slovak Republic to J. K. and it is the result of the projects ITMS 26240120027 and ITMS 26210120024 supported by the Research & Development Operational Programme funded by the ERDF.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Genetics, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Comenius University, Mlynská dolina G-1, 842 15, Bratislava, Slovak Republic

    Lucia Hadariová, Erik Birčák & Juraj Krajčovič

  2. Department of Biology and Ecology, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Matej Bel University, 974 01, Banská Bystrica, Slovakia

    Matej Vesteg

  3. Department of Biology, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN, 38152-3560, USA

    Steven D. Schwartzbach

  4. Department of Biology, Faculty of Natural Sciences, University of ss. Cyril and Methodius, 917 01, Trnava, Slovakia

    Juraj Krajčovič

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  1. Lucia Hadariová
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Correspondence to Juraj Krajčovič.

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Hadariová, L., Vesteg, M., Birčák, E. et al. An intact plastid genome is essential for the survival of colorless Euglena longa but not Euglena gracilis . Curr Genet 63, 331–341 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00294-016-0641-z

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