Single-Cell Genomics Reveals the Divergent Mitochondrial Genomes of Retaria (Foraminifera and Radiolaria)
Jan‐Niklas Macher, Nicole Coots, Yu-Ping Poh, Elsa B. Girard, Anouk Langerak, Sergio A. Muñoz-Gómez, Savar Sinha, Dagmar Jírsová, Rutger Vos, Richard Wissels, Gillian H. Gile, Willem Renema, Jeremy G. Wideman
Abstract
We present the reduced mitochondrial genomes of Retaria, the rhizarian lineage comprising the phyla Foraminifera and Radiolaria. By applying single-cell genomic approaches, we found that foraminiferan and radiolarian mitochondrial genomes contain an overlapping but reduced mitochondrial gene complement compared to other sequenced rhizarians. An alternative genetic code was identified in radiolarian mitogenomes in which all three stop codons encode amino acids. Collectively, these results shed light on the divergent nature of the mitochondrial genomes from an ecologically important group, warranting further questions into the biological underpinnings of gene content variability and genetic code variation between mitochondrial genomes.