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The Draft Genome of Ciona intestinalis : Insights into Chordate and Vertebrate Origins

Paramvir Dehal, Yutaka Satou, R. Keith Campbell, Jarrod Chapman, Bernard M. Degnan, Anthony De Tomaso, Brad Davidson, Anna Di Gregorio, Maarten D. Sollewijn Gelpke, David Goodstein, Naoe Harafuji, Kenneth E.M. Hastings, Isaac Ho, Kohji Hotta, Wayne Huang, Takeshi Kawashima, Patrick Lemaire, Diego Martínez, Ian A. Meinertzhagen, Simona Necula, Masaru Nonaka, Nik Putnam, Sam Rash, Hidetoshi Saiga, Masanobu Satake, Astrid Terry, Lixy Yamada, Hong‐Gang Wang, Satoko Awazu, Kaoru Azumi, Jeffrey L. Boore, Margherita Branno, Stephen T. Chin-Bow, Rosaria Desantis, Sharon A. Doyle, M. Pilar Francino, David N. Keys, Shinobu Haga, Hiroko Hayashi, Kyosuke Hino, Kaoru S. Imai, Kazuo Inaba, Shungo Kano, Kenji Kobayashi, Mari Kobayashi, Byung-In Lee, Kazuhiro W. Makabe, Chitra Manohar, Giorgio Matassi, Mónica Medina, Yasuaki Mochizuki, Steve Mount, Tomomi Morishita, Sachiko Miura, A. Nakayama, Satoko Nishizaka, Hisayo Nomoto, Fumiko Ohta, Kazuko Oishi, Isidore Rigoutsos, Masako Sano, Akane Sasaki, Yasunori Sasakura, Eiichi Shoguchi, Tadasu Shin‐I, Antonietta Spagnuolo, Didier Y. R. Stainier, Miho Suzuki, Olivier Tassy, Naohito Takatori, Miki Tokuoka, Kasumi Yagi, Fumiko Yoshizaki, Shuichi Wada, Cindy Zhang, P. Douglas Hyatt, Frank W. Larimer, Chris Detter, Norman A. Doggett, Tijana Glavina, Trevor Hawkins, Paul Richardson, Susan Lucas, Yuji Kohara, Michael Levine, Nori Satoh, Daniel S. Rokhsar

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Abstract

The first chordates appear in the fossil record at the time of the Cambrian explosion, nearly 550 million years ago. The modern ascidian tadpole represents a plausible approximation to these ancestral chordates. To illuminate the origins of chordate and vertebrates, we generated a draft of the protein-coding portion of the genome of the most studied ascidian, Ciona intestinalis. The Ciona genome contains approximately 16,000 protein-coding genes, similar to the number in other invertebrates, but only half that found in vertebrates. Vertebrate gene families are typically found in simplified form in Ciona, suggesting that ascidians contain the basic ancestral complement of genes involved in cell signaling and development. The ascidian genome has also acquired a number of lineage-specific innovations, including a group of genes engaged in cellulose metabolism that are related to those in bacteria and fungi.

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The first chordates appear in the fossil record at the time of the Cambrian explosion, nearly 550 million years ago. The modern ascidian tadpole represents a plausible approximation to these ancestral chordates. To illuminate the origins of chordate and vertebrates, we generated a draft of the protein-coding portion of the genome of the most studied ascidian, Ciona intestinalis. The Ciona genome contains approximately 16,000 protein-coding genes, similar to the number in other invertebrates, but only half that found in vertebrates. Vertebrate gene families are typically found in simplified form in Ciona, suggesting that ascidians contain the basic ancestral complement of genes involved in cell signaling and development. The ascidian genome has also acquired a number of lineage-specific innovations, including a group of genes engaged in cellulose metabolism that are related to those in bacteria and fungi.

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Available abstract

The first chordates appear in the fossil record at the time of the Cambrian explosion, nearly 550 million years ago. The modern ascidian tadpole represents a plausible approximation to these ancestral chordates. To illuminate the origins of chordate and vertebrates, we generated a draft of the protein-coding portion of the genome of the most studied ascidian, Ciona intestinalis. The Ciona genome contains approximately 16,000 protein-coding genes, similar to the number in other invertebrates, but only half that found in vertebrates. Vertebrate gene families are typically found in simplified form in Ciona, suggesting that ascidians contain the basic ancestral complement of genes involved in cell signaling and development. The ascidian genome has also acquired a number of lineage-specific innovations, including a group of genes engaged in cellulose metabolism that are related to those in bacteria and fungi.

Key concepts: Ciona intestinalis, Chordate, Ciona, Biology, Vertebrate, Genome, Evolutionary biology, Lineage (genetic)

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