Hemoglobins in the genome of the cryptomonad Guillardia theta

REVIEWERS: This article was reviewed by Purificacion Lopez-Garcia and Igor B Rogozin. Cryptomonads, are a lineage of unicellular and mostly photosynthetic algae, that acquired their plastids through the “secondary” endosymbiosis of a red alga — and still retain the nuclear genome (nucleomorph) of the latter. We find that the genome of the cryptomonad Guillardia theta comprises genes coding for 13 globin domains, of which 6 occur within two large chimeric proteins. All the sequences adhere to the vertebrate 3/3 myoglobin fold. Although several globins have no introns, the remainder have atypical intron locations. Bayesian phylogenetic analyses suggest that the G. theta Hbs are related to the stramenopile and chlorophyte single domain globins.