RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Origins of major archaeal clades do not correspond to gene acquisitions from bacteria
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 019851
DO 10.1101/019851
A1 Mathieu Groussin
A1 Bastien Boussau
A1 Gergely Szöllősi
A1 Laura Eme
A1 Manolo Gouy
A1 Céline Brochier-Armanet
A1 Vincent Daubin
YR 2015
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2015/05/27/019851.abstract
AB In a recent articxle, Nelson-Sathi et al. [NS] report that the origins of Major Archaeal Lineages [MAL] correspond to massive group-specific gene acquisitions via horizontal gene transfer (HGT) from bacteria (Nelson-Sathi et al., 2015, Nature 517(7532):77-80). If correct, this would have fundamental implications for the process of diversification in microbes. However, a re-examination of these data and results shows that the methodology used by NS systematically inflates the number of genes acquired at the root of each MAL, and incorrectly assumes bacterial origins for these genes. A re-analysis of their data with appropriate phylogenetic models accounting for the dynamics of gene gain and loss between lineages supports the continuous acquisition of genes over long periods in the evolution of Archaea.