-
- Yamaguchi Masashi
- Medical Mycology Research Center, Chiba University
-
- Worman Cedric O’Driscoll
- Department of Biology, Francis Marion University
Search this article
Abstract
Living cells are deeply divided into two enormously divergent levels of complexity: prokaryotic and eukaryotic. Eukaryotes are thought to have developed from prokaryotic predecessors; however the large differences in their cellular structures results in equally large questions of how the process might have occurred. In 2012, in the deep-sea off the coast of Japan, we discovered a unique microorganism appearing to have cellular features intermediate between prokaryotes and eukaryotes. The organism, the Myojin parakaryote (tentatively named by Yamaguchi et al., 2012), was two orders of magnitude larger than a typical bacterium and had a large “nucleoid”, consisting of naked DNA fibers, surrounded by a single layered “nucleoid membrane”, and bacteria-like “endosymbionts”, but it lacked mitochondria. This organism exemplifies a potential evolutionary path between prokaryotes and eukaryotes, and strongly supports the endosymbiotic theory for the origin of mitochondria and the karyogenetic hypothesis for the origin of the nucleus. In this review, we describe how the Myojin parakaryote was discovered, the features of this organism, the significance of the discovery, and perspectives on future research.
Journal
-
- Japanese Journal of Protozoology
-
Japanese Journal of Protozoology 47 (1-2), 29-48, 2014
Japan Society of Protistology
- Tweet
Keywords
Details 詳細情報について
-
- CRID
- 1390001204714317440
-
- NII Article ID
- 130005254722
-
- NII Book ID
- AN00078173
-
- ISSN
- 21896747
- 03883752
-
- NDL BIB ID
- 025926311
-
- Text Lang
- en
-
- Data Source
-
- JaLC
- NDL
- CiNii Articles
-
- Abstract License Flag
- Disallowed