Genomic Minimalism in the Early Diverging Intestinal Parasite Giardia lamblia
Abstract
The genome of the eukaryotic protist Giardia lamblia, an important human intestinal parasite, is compact in structure and content, contains few introns or mitochondrial relics, and has simplified machinery for DNA replication, transcription, RNA processing, and most metabolic pathways. Protein kinases comprise the single largest protein class and reflect Giardia's requirement for a complex signal transduction network for coordinating differentiation. Lateral gene transfer from bacterial and archaeal donors has shaped Giardia's genome, and previously unknown gene families, for example, cysteine-rich structural proteins, have been discovered. Unexpectedly, the genome shows little evidence of heterozygosity, supporting recent speculations that this organism is sexual. This genome sequence will not only be valuable for investigating the evolution of eukaryotes, but will also be applied to the search for new therapeutics for this parasite.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Sequencing of the first G. intestinalis genome revealed the presence of 21 alpha-giardin genes that showed clear evidence of repeated duplications and divergence.
“Sequencing of the first G. intestinalis genome revealed the presence of 21 alpha-giardin genes that showed clear evidence of repeated duplications and divergence (4, 12).”
From Comparative Cell Biology and Evolution of Annexins in Diplomonads (2016) · cites this paper as [12]
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Horizontal gene transfer in eukaryotic evolution
Keeling, P. J., & Palmer, J. D. (2008) · Nature Reviews Genetics · doi:10.1038/nrg2386 · Cited by 1,355 · see citing works
Biochemistry and Evolution of Anaerobic Energy Metabolism in Eukaryotes
Müller, M., Mentel, M., van Hellemond, J. J., Henze, K., Woehle, C., Gould, S. B., Yu, R.-Y., van der Giezen, M., Tielens, A. G. M., & Martin, W. F. (2012) · Microbiology and Molecular Biology Reviews · doi:10.1128/mmbr.05024-11 · Cited by 838 · see citing works
Plasticity of the Hsp90 chaperone machine in divergent eukaryotic organisms
Johnson, J. L., & Brown, C. (2009) · Cell Stress and Chaperones · doi:10.1007/s12192-008-0058-9 · Cited by 119 · see citing works
Novel Structural Components of the Ventral Disc and Lateral Crest in Giardia intestinalis
Hagen, K. D., Hirakawa, M. P., House, S. A., Schwartz, C. L., Pham, J. K., Cipriano, M. J., De La Torre, M. J., Sek, A. C., Du, G., Forsythe, B. M., et al. (2011) · PLoS Neglected Tropical Diseases · doi:10.1371/journal.pntd.0001442 · Cited by 76 · see citing works
Self-citationDeep Questions in the Tree of Life
Keeling, P. J. (2007) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.1149593 · Cited by 33 · see citing works
Roxström-Lindquist, K., Jerlström-Hultqvist, J., Jørgensen, A., Troell, K., Svärd, S. G., & Andersson, J. O. (2010) · BMC Genomics · doi:10.1186/1471-2164-11-258 · Cited by 29 · see citing works
Self-citationŠarić, M., Vahrmann, A., Niebur, D., Kluempers, V., Hehl, A. B., & Scholze, H. (2009) · Eukaryotic Cell · doi:10.1128/ec.00136-09 · Cited by 24 · see citing works
Self-citationComparative Cell Biology and Evolution of Annexins in Diplomonads
Einarsson, E., Ástvaldsson, Á., Hultenby, K., Andersson, J. O., Svärd, S. G., & Jerlström-Hultqvist, J. (2016) · mSphere · doi:10.1128/msphere.00032-15 · Cited by 15 · see citing works
“intestinalis genome revealed the presence of 21 alpha-giardin genes that showed clear evidence of repeated duplications and divergence (4, 12).”
BackgroundSelf-citation
- Authors
- Morrison, H. G., McArthur, A. G., Gillin, F. D., Aley, S. B., Adam, R. D., Olsen, G. J., Best, A. A., Cande, W. Z., Chen, F., Cipriano, M. J., Davids, B. J., Dawson, S. C., Elmendorf, H. G., Hehl, A. B., Holder, M. E., Huse, S. M., Kim, U. U., Lasek-Nesselquist, E., Manning, G., Nigam, A., Nixon, J. E. J., Palm, D., Passamaneck, N. E., Prabhu, A., Reich, C. I., Reiner, D. S., Samuelson, J., Svard, S. G., & Sogin, M. L.
- Affiliations
- Marine Biological Laboratory (US)
- Marine Biological Laboratory, Woods Hole, MA 02543â1015, USA.
- Corresponding author
- Morrison, Hilary G.
- ORCID
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 2007-09-28
- Volume
- 317
- Issue
- 5846
- Pages
- 1921-1926
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W1978570354
- Cited by
- 793
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 17 · 2025: 16 · 2024: 21 · 2023: 22 · 2022: 27 · 2021: 47 · 2020: 48 · 2019: 26 · 2018: 33 · 2017: 41 · 2016: 41 · 2015: 27 · 2014: 42 · 2013: 34 · 2012: 62
- FWCI
- 26.65
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Science (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- National Human Genome Research Institute (R01HG004164)
- National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (AI42488, AI51687, R01AI054693, R01AI048082, R01AI051687, R01AI042488, AI43273)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Protist diversity and phylogeny
- Life Sciences › Immunology and Microbiology › Parasitology › Parasitic Infections and Diagnostics
- Life Sciences › Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology › Molecular Biology › Genomics and Phylogenetic Studies
- Keywords
- Giardia lamblia, genome compactness, genome reduction, protein kinases, signal transduction, differentiation, horizontal gene transfer, heterozygosity, sexual reproduction, eukaryotic evolution, intestinal parasites, therapeutics
- MeSH terms
- Amino Acid Sequence, Animals, DNA Replication, Eukaryotic Cells, Biological Evolution, Molecular Sequence Data, Phylogeny, Protein Kinases, RNA Processing, Post-Transcriptional, Transcription, Genetic, Signal Transduction, Protozoan Proteins, Giardia lamblia, Genes, Protozoan, Genome, Protozoan, Gene Transfer, Horizontal, Genomics, Metabolic Networks and Pathways
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
