The complete chloroplast genome sequence of Chlorella vulgaris and phylogenetic analysis

Abstract

To understand the process of chloroplast genome evolution, information on repeated sequences, intergenic regions, and pseudogenes in chloroplast DNA is extremely helpful. Chlorella vulgaris is a fast-growing fresh-water microalga cultivated on the industrial scale for applications ranging from food to biofuel production. Structure and expression of the chloroplast genome have been studied in a number of plants. Gene content and the sequence of many genes in chloroplast DNA are relatively conserved among land plants and the Euglenophyta Euglena gracilis. The complete chloroplast genome sequence of C. vulgaris was characterized from Illumina pair-end sequencing. The chloroplast genome of C. vulgaris was 165,412 bp in length and the genome contains no large inverted repeat and has one copy of rRNA gene cluster consisting of 16S, 23S, and 5S rRNA genes. And the genes with two exons containing rrn23 (rRNA), trnl-UAA (tRNA), psba (CDS) and chlL (CDS). The genome contains 114 complete genes, including 78 protein-coding genes (45 protein-coding gene species), 33 tRNA genes (26 tRNA species), and 3 rRNA genes (3 rRNA species). The neighbour-joining phylogenetic analysis showed that C. vulgaris and C. vulgarisNC001865 clustered together as sisters to other Salvia species.