Genome-wide Comparative Analysis Reveals Possible Common Ancestors of NBS Domain Containing Genes in Hybrid Citrus sinensis Genome and Original Citrus clementina Genome

Background Recently available whole genome sequences of three citrus species: one Citrus clementina and two Citrus sinensis genomes have made it possible to understand the features of candidate disease resistance genes with nucleotide-binding sites (NBS) domain in Citrus and how NBS genes differ between hybrid and original Citrus species. Result We identified and re-annotated NBS genes from three citrus genomes and found similar numbers of NBS genes in those citrus genomes. Phylogenetic analysis of all citrus NBS genes across three genomes showed that there are three approximately evenly numbered groups: one group contains the Toll-Interleukin receptor (TIR) domain and two different groups that contain the Coiled Coil (CC) domain. Motif analysis confirmed that the two groups of CC-containing NBS genes are from different evolutionary origins. We partitioned NBS genes into clades using NBS domain sequence distances and found most clades include NBS genes from all three citrus genomes. This suggests that NBS genes in three citrus genomes may come from shared ancestral origins. We also mapped the re-sequenced reads of three pomelo and three Mandarin orange genomes onto the Citrus sinensis genome. We found that most NBS genes of th...Continue Reading