Mt. Arganoza et Ra. Akins, RECOMBINANT MITOCHONDRIAL PLASMIDS IN NEUROSPORA COMPOSED OF VARKUD AND A NEW MULTIMERIC MITOCHONDRIAL PLASMID, Current genetics, 29(1), 1995, pp. 34-43
A mitochondrial plasmid, V5124, in Neurospora intermedia isolate 5124
has a deletion in its sequence relative to the highly similar Mauricev
ille and Varkud plasmids. These insertions in the latter plasmids are
28 bp in length and are positioned at sites that correspond to their m
ajor transcript 5' termini. The 28-bp sequence is nearly identical to
a putative processing site upstream of the ND4L gene on the mitochondr
ial genome. The absence of this 28-bp sequence in V5124 apparently res
ults in transcripts whose 5' termini correspond to an upstream consens
us promoter sequence. Two variant forms of V5124 coexist with V5124 an
d have either of two similar 0.3-kb inserts positioned exactly as is t
he 28-bp insert in Varkud. These long inserts are chimeric, partly der
iving from a newly discovered multimeric plasmid, MP. MP has significa
nt similarity to a short region of the mitochondrial satellite plasmid
VS. Another part of the 0.3-kb inserts in V5124 variants derives from
the mitochondrial genome, within restriction fragment EcoRI-8. Neuros
pora mitochondria in many isolates can have several types of mitochond
rial plasmids belonging to different homology groups. We propose that
a common ancestral plasmid acquired insertions from either the mitocho
ndrial genome or from other plasmids. The V5124 variants are the first
instance of a chimeric mitochondrial plasmid in which distinct plasmi
ds have recombined. This recombination proves that different plasmids
coexist currently, or else did so at some point in their evolution, wi
thin a single mitochondrion.