Abstract
BackgroundThe human protozoan parasite Trichomonas vaginalis is an organism of interest for understanding eukaryotic evolution. Despite having an unusually large genome and a rich gene repertoire among protists, spliceosomal introns in T. vaginalis appear rare: only 62 putative introns have been annotated in this genome, and little or no experimental evidence exists to back up these predictions.ResultsThis study revisited the 62 annotated introns of T. vaginalis derived from the genome sequencing plus previous publications. After experimental validation and a new genome-wide search, we confirmed the presence of introns in 32 genes and 18 others were concluded to be intronless. Sequence analyses classified the validated introns into two types, based on distinctive features such as length and conservation of splice site motifs.ConclusionsOur study provides an updated list of intron-containing genes in the genome of T. vaginalis. Our findings suggests the existence of two intron ‘families’ spread among T. vaginalis protein-coding genes. Additional studies are needed to understand the functional separation of these two classes of introns and to assess the existence of further introns in the T. vaginalis genome.
Highlights
The human protozoan parasite Trichomonas vaginalis is an organism of interest for understanding eukaryotic evolution
Splicing is achieved by a ribonucleoprotein complex through recognition of sequence elements on the introns such as the 5' and 3' splice sites (SS) and the branch site (BS) [1]
The second dataset consists of 42 gene sequences, each carrying a single putative intron that were described in earlier publications [15, 16]
Summary
The human protozoan parasite Trichomonas vaginalis is an organism of interest for understanding eukaryotic evolution. Despite having an unusually large genome and a rich gene repertoire among protists, spliceosomal introns in T. vaginalis appear rare: only 62 putative introns have been annotated in this genome, and little or no experimental evidence exists to back up these predictions. Introns, intervening non-coding sequences in genes of eukaryotes, are precisely removed from pre-mRNA by splicing, yielding mature mRNA. One species where our understanding of introns remains patchy is Trichomonas vaginalis. This is a protozoan parasite of the human urogenital tract and the causative agent of trichomoniasis, the most prevalent non-viral sexually transmitted infection worldwide [8].
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