TY - JOUR
KW - Animals
KW - Armadillos
KW - DNA, Bacterial
KW - Energy Metabolism
KW - Evolution, Molecular
KW - Gene Transfer, Horizontal
KW - Genome, Bacterial
KW - Humans
KW - leprosy
KW - Molecular Sequence Data
KW - Multigene Family
KW - Mycobacterium leprae
KW - Sequence Analysis, DNA
AU - Cole S T
AU - Eiglmeier K
AU - Parkhill J
AU - James K D
AU - Thomson N R
AU - Wheeler P R
AU - Honoré N
AU - Garnier T
AU - Churcher C
AU - Harris D
AU - Mungall K
AU - Basham D
AU - Brown D
AU - Chillingworth T
AU - Connor R
AU - Davies R M
AU - Devlin K
AU - Duthoy S
AU - Feltwell T
AU - Fraser A
AU - Hamlin N
AU - Holroyd S
AU - Hornsby T
AU - Jagels K
AU - Lacroix C
AU - Maclean J
AU - Moule S
AU - Murphy L
AU - Oliver K
AU - Quail M A
AU - Rajandream M A
AU - Rutherford K M
AU - Rutter S
AU - Seeger K
AU - Simon S
AU - Simmonds M
AU - Skelton J
AU - Squares R
AU - Squares S
AU - Stevens K
AU - Taylor K
AU - Whitehead S
AU - Woodward J R
AU - Barrell B G
AB - <p>Leprosy, a chronic human neurological disease, results from infection with the obligate intracellular pathogen Mycobacterium leprae, a close relative of the tubercle bacillus. Mycobacterium leprae has the longest doubling time of all known bacteria and has thwarted every effort at culture in the laboratory. Comparing the 3.27-megabase (Mb) genome sequence of an armadillo-derived Indian isolate of the leprosy bacillus with that of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (4.41 Mb) provides clear explanations for these properties and reveals an extreme case of reductive evolution. Less than half of the genome contains functional genes but pseudogenes, with intact counterparts in M. tuberculosis, abound. Genome downsizing and the current mosaic arrangement appear to have resulted from extensive recombination events between dispersed repetitive sequences. Gene deletion and decay have eliminated many important metabolic activities including siderophore production, part of the oxidative and most of the microaerophilic and anaerobic respiratory chains, and numerous catabolic systems and their regulatory circuits.</p>
BT - Nature
C1 - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11234002?dopt=Abstract
CN - COLE 2001
DA - 2001 Feb 22
DO - 10.1038/35059006
IS - 6823
J2 - Nature
LA - eng
N2 - <p>Leprosy, a chronic human neurological disease, results from infection with the obligate intracellular pathogen Mycobacterium leprae, a close relative of the tubercle bacillus. Mycobacterium leprae has the longest doubling time of all known bacteria and has thwarted every effort at culture in the laboratory. Comparing the 3.27-megabase (Mb) genome sequence of an armadillo-derived Indian isolate of the leprosy bacillus with that of Mycobacterium tuberculosis (4.41 Mb) provides clear explanations for these properties and reveals an extreme case of reductive evolution. Less than half of the genome contains functional genes but pseudogenes, with intact counterparts in M. tuberculosis, abound. Genome downsizing and the current mosaic arrangement appear to have resulted from extensive recombination events between dispersed repetitive sequences. Gene deletion and decay have eliminated many important metabolic activities including siderophore production, part of the oxidative and most of the microaerophilic and anaerobic respiratory chains, and numerous catabolic systems and their regulatory circuits.</p>
PY - 2001
SP - 1007
EP - 11
T2 - Nature
TI - Massive gene decay in the leprosy bacillus.
UR - http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v409/n6823/pdf/4091007a0.pdf
VL - 409
SN - 0028-0836
ER -