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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Plant Bioinformatics
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fpls.2024.1442178
This article is part of the Research Topic Evolutionary Dynamics, Functional Variation and Application of Plant Organellar Genome View all 3 articles

Comparison of Organelle Genomes Between Endangered Mangrove Plant Dolichandrone spathacea to Terrestrial Relative Provides Insights into Its Origin and Adaptative Evolution

Provisionally accepted
Ying Zhang Ying Zhang 1Jingwen Zhang Jingwen Zhang 2Zewei Chen Zewei Chen 3Yanni Huang Yanni Huang 3Jiaxuan Liu Jiaxuan Liu 4Yuqi Liu Yuqi Liu 4Yong Yang Yong Yang 2Xiang Jin Xiang Jin 2Yuchen Yang Yuchen Yang 5*Yiqing Chen Yiqing Chen 1
  • 1 Hainan Academy of Forestry, Haikou, Hainan Province, China
  • 2 Hainan Normal University, Haikou, Hainan Province, China
  • 3 Lingnan Normal University, Zhanjiang, Guangdong, China
  • 4 Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China
  • 5 School of Ecology, Sun Yat-sen University, Shenzhen, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Dolichandrone spathacea is a mangrove associate with high medicinal and ecological values. However, due to the dual-pressure of global climate change and human activities, D. spathacea has become endangered in China. Moreover, misidentification between D. spathacea and its terrestrial relatives D. cauda-felina poses further challenges to field protection and proper medicinal usage of D. spathacea.Thus, to address these problems, we sequenced and assembled mitochondrial (mt) and chloroplast (cp) genomes for both D. spathacea and D. cauda-felina. Comparative analysis revealed apparently different size and scaffold number between the two mt genomes, but a high similarity between the cp genomes.Eight regions with high sequence divergence were identified between the two cp genomes, which might be used for developing candidate DNA markers for distinguishing the two species. The splitting between D. spathacea and D. cauda-felina was inferred to occur at ~6.8 -7.7 million years ago (Mya), which may be driven by the environment fluctuations in late Miocene. In the cp genome, 12 genes related to the expression of photosynthesis-associated proteins were detected with signatures of positive selection, which may contribute to the origin and evolutionary adaptation of Dolichandrone mangrove species. These new findings do not only enrich organelle genomic resources of Dolichandrone species, but also provide important genetic clues for improving the conservation and proper usage of endangered mangrove associate D. spathacea.

    Keywords: mangrove associate, Mitochondrial and chloroplast genomes, sequence divergence, Splitting time, positive selection

    Received: 01 Jun 2024; Accepted: 02 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Zhang, Zhang, Chen, Huang, Liu, Liu, Yang, Jin, Yang and Chen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Yuchen Yang, School of Ecology, Sun Yat-sen University, Shenzhen, China

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