The early history of life harbours many unresolved evolutionary questions, none more important than the genomic origin and cellular evolution of eukaryotes. An issue central to eukaryote origin concerns the position o...The early history of life harbours many unresolved evolutionary questions, none more important than the genomic origin and cellular evolution of eukaryotes. An issue central to eukaryote origin concerns the position of eukaryotes in the tree of life and the relationship of the host lineage that acquired the mitochondrion some two billion years ago to lineages of modern-day archaea. Recent analyses indicate that the host lineage branches within the Archaea, prompting the search for novel archaeal lineages that can improve our understanding of the cellular evolution of eukaryotes. Here we give a brief review of the studies on Archaea, the tree of life and the cellular evolution of eukaryotes, which is followed by an overview of recent progress fueled by new genomic technologies and recent status of archaeal research in China. Future directions for the study of early evolution are considered.展开更多
基金supported by theState Key R & D Project of China (Grant No. 2018YFA0605802)the Na-tional Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 91851210,41530105 & 41673073)+2 种基金the Key Project of Natural Science Foundation ofGuangdong Province (Grant No. 2018B030311016)the Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Marine Archaea Geo-Omics, Southern University of Scienceand Technologythe Laboratory for Marine Geology, Qingdao NationalLaboratory for Marine Science and Technology (Grant No. MGQNLM-TD201810)
文摘The early history of life harbours many unresolved evolutionary questions, none more important than the genomic origin and cellular evolution of eukaryotes. An issue central to eukaryote origin concerns the position of eukaryotes in the tree of life and the relationship of the host lineage that acquired the mitochondrion some two billion years ago to lineages of modern-day archaea. Recent analyses indicate that the host lineage branches within the Archaea, prompting the search for novel archaeal lineages that can improve our understanding of the cellular evolution of eukaryotes. Here we give a brief review of the studies on Archaea, the tree of life and the cellular evolution of eukaryotes, which is followed by an overview of recent progress fueled by new genomic technologies and recent status of archaeal research in China. Future directions for the study of early evolution are considered.
