The homeodomain complement of the ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi suggests that Ctenophora and Porifera diverged prior to the ParaHoxozoa.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The much-debated phylogenetic relationships of the five early branching metazoan lineages (Bilateria, Cnidaria, Ctenophora, Placozoa and Porifera) are of fundamental importance in piecing together events that occurred early in animal evolution. Comparisons of gene content between organismal lineages have been identified as a potentially useful methodology for phylogenetic reconstruction. However, these comparisons require complete genomes that, until now, did not exist for the ctenophore lineage. The homeobox superfamily of genes is particularly suited for these kinds of gene content comparisons, since it is large, diverse, and features a highly conserved domain.

Results

We have used a next-generation sequencing approach to generate a high-quality rough draft of t

SUBMITTER: Ryan JF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2959044 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature