Fig. 2.

Loss of photosynthesis and convergent evolution of plastid-encoded gene repertoires in Volvocales. a Phylogenetic position of the chlamydomonad sp. NrCl902 in the 18S rRNA gene tree of Volvocales green algae. Non-photosynthetic lineages are highlighted in gray. Numbers at each branch show ML bootstrap values > 90%, whereas thick branches show the PhyloBayes posterior probabilities > 0.95. b Comparison of gene repertoires in plastid genomes of photosynthetic and non-photosynthetic Volvocales green algae. Genes highlighted in gray are those shared by plastid genomes of photosynthetic volvocales green algae and non-photosynthetic species, Polytoma and chlamydomonad sp. NrCl902, while genes highlighted in green are those present in plastid genomes of photosynthetic volvocales green algae but absent from those of the non-photosynthetic species. The plastid genome of Polytoma is represented by P. uvella. Protein-coding gene repertoires of the plastid genomes of P. uvella and chlamydomonad sp. NrCl902 are found to be identical. Note that Polytomella spp. are known to lack plastid DNAs completely [12]