This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Many plant species parasitize other plants by latching on and taking the nutrients their hosts need to survive. But sometimes, plants steal more than nutrients; they take genes.
A new study shows how one such "stolen" gene was not simply preserved after entering the genome of the parasitic dodder (Cuscuta spp.). Instead, the parasite remodeled the gene over millions of years while keeping its original function intact. The findings were published in Plant Physiology.
The gene was transferred through a process known as horizontal gene transfer (HGT). Unlike ordinary inheritance, in which genes pass from parent to offspring, HGT allows genetic material to move between unrelated organisms. A research team led by Professor Koh Aoki of the Graduate School of Agriculture, Osaka Metropolitan University, investigated what happens to these foreign genes after they arrive in a parasitic plant.
Working with researchers from Suntory Global Innovation Center Ltd., the National Institute for Basic Biology and other institutions, the team traced the evolutionary history of the CYP81Q gene. They found evidence that CYP81Q originally belonged to another flowering plant in the order Lamiales—which includes many medicinal and culinary herbs—before being transferred to the dodder lineage in the distant past. The gene gave dodders something useful, as CYP81Q is involved in producing sesamin, a lignan compound with antioxidant properties.
After acquiring the gene, dodders gained the ability to produce sesamin themselves. Over time, the foreign gene was changed in the dodder genome by pieces of transposable elements called "jumping DNA," which inserted dodder DNA into CYP81Q. One of these inserted sequences eventually became part of a newly formed intron, a section of a gene that is removed from its RNA before the genetic instructions are used to make a protein.
Despite undergoing these changes, the gene continued to work. The remodeled CYP81Q still produced a functional enzyme capable of synthesizing sesamin. "This demonstrated that the gene had retained its biological function despite substantial structural changes," Aoki summarized.
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