  | Related Articles |
Gene transfer: anything goes in plant mitochondria.
BMC Biol. 2010;8:147
Authors: Archibald JM, Richards TA
Abstract
Parasitic plants and their hosts have proven remarkably adept at exchanging fragments of mitochondrial DNA. Two recent studies provide important mechanistic insights into the pattern, process and consequences of horizontal gene transfer, demonstrating that genes can be transferred in large chunks and that gene conversion between foreign and native genes leads to intragenic mosaicism. A model involving duplicative horizontal gene transfer and differential gene conversion is proposed as a hitherto unrecognized source of genetic diversity.
PMID: 21176244 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Recent Comments