The Spirogyra pratensis genome illuminates the evolution of developmental programs and spiral chloroplast biology

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ID: 322913
2026
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Abstract
Zygnematophytes emerged as the unexpected closest algal relatives of land plants despite their simple body plans, raising questions about the morphogenetic toolkit present in the last common ancestor of land plants and algae. Genomic analyses have revealed that zygnematophytes are cellular giants, sharing homologous frameworks for several phytohormones, secondary metabolites, and key morphogenetic and transcriptional regulatory processes. Zygnematophytes fall into five orders, each of which has chartered its own evolutionary path. Here, we have sequenced a contiguous genome of Spirogyra pratensis, the eponymous representative of Spirogyrales and a classical model system for evolutionary cell biology in the green lineage. Building on this genome, we transcriptionally profiled the tractable life cycle of Spirogyra and its responses to a bifactorial gradient of light and temperature. Our data highlight the activation of quiescence and homeostatic programs. Yet what stands out most in Spirogyra is its spiral chloroplast-undulating intracellularly and abscising during mixed phragmoplast formation and furrowing. Leveraging the genome in tandem with co-expression network analyses, we describe the molecular underpinnings of the unique cytokinetic processes that govern both cell and plastid division. We find that Spirogyra deploys a molecular program characteristic of Phragmoplastophyta, yet lacks the deeply conserved plastid division machinery found in other archaeplastid plastids.
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Authors Elisa S. Goldbecker, Deepti Varshney, Anja Holzhausen, Tatyana Darienko, Hong Zhou, Armin Dadras, Lukáš Pfeifer, Thomas Proeschold, Elvira López‐Gómez, Elke Woelken, Charlotte Permann, Tassilo Erik Wollenweber, Kerstin Becker, Stefanie König, Franz Hadaček, Fay‐Wei Li, Ivo Feußner, Noé Fernández‐Pozo, Andreas Holzinger, Florian Maumus, André Marques, Henrik Buschmann, Klaus von Schwartzenberg, Jan de Vries, Stefan A. Rensing
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Journal The Plant cell
Year 2026
DOI
10.1093/plcell/koag224
URL
https://doi.org/10.1093/plcell/koag224
Keywords Keywords not found

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