Abstract
Studying the evolution of macromolecular assemblies is important to improve our understanding of how complex cellular structures evolved, and to identify the functional building blocks that are involved. Recent studies suggest that the macromolecular complexes that are involved in two distinct processes in Myxococcus xanthus — surface motility and sporulation — are derived from an ancestral polysaccharide capsule assembly system. In this Opinion article, we argue that the available data suggest that the motility machinery evolved from this capsule assembly system following a gene duplication event, a change in carbohydrate polymer specificity and the acquisition of additional proteins by the motility complex, all of which are key features that distinguish the motility and sporulation systems. Furthermore, the presence of intermediates of these systems in bacterial genomes suggests a testable evolutionary model for their emergence and spread.
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Change history
27 April 2015
In the above article, the credit lines for Figure 2a,d and Figure 4 were incorrect and have been corrected online. We apologize to the readers for any misunderstanding caused.
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Acknowledgements
The authors thank E. Mauriello and J.P. Castaing for comments to improve the manuscript. C.B.-A. is supported by the Investissement d'Avenir grant Ancestrome (ANR-10-BINF-01-01) and is a member of the Institut Universitaire de France. This work was supported by a European Research Council starting grant (DOME 261105) to T.M. and a coup d'élan pour la recherche française award (2011) from the Bettencourt–Schueller foundation to T.M.
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Supplementary information S1 (table)
agl gene sequence used for logo construction using the Phylo-mLogo program (XLSX 37 kb)
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Agrebi, R., Wartel, M., Brochier-Armanet, C. et al. An evolutionary link between capsular biogenesis and surface motility in bacteria. Nat Rev Microbiol 13, 318–326 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrmicro3431
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nrmicro3431
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