The complete mitochondrial DNA sequence of the pantropical earthworm Pontoscolex corethrurus (Rhinodrilidae, Clitellata): Mitogenome characterization and phylogenetic positioning

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1 Departamento de Ciências do Solo, Universidade Federal do Paraná, Curitiba, Parana, Brazil
2 CIRN/Biologia, Universidade dos Acores, Ponta Delgada, Azores, Portugal
3 Biological Sciences, Cardiff University, Cardiff, Wales, United Kingdom
4 Sustainable Living Dept., Maharishi University of Management, Fairfield, IA, United States
5 Biological Sciences, Cardiff University, Cardiff, United Kingdom
6 Florestas, EMBRAPA, Colombo, Parana, Brazil
7 Institut d’écologie et des sciences de l’environnement de Paris, Université Paris Est Créteil, Creteil, France
8 Centro de Vulcanologia e Avaliação de Riscos Geológicos, Universidade dos Acores, Ponta Delgada, Azores, Portugal
9 Laboratorio Nacional de Genómica para la Biodiversidad, Unidad de Genómica Avanzada, Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados del Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
DOI
10.7287/peerj.preprints.2847v1
Published
Accepted
Subject Areas
Environmental Sciences, Genetics, Molecular Biology, Soil Science
Keywords
Pontoscolex corethrurus, Rhinodrilidae, mitochondrial genome, earthworm
Copyright
© 2017 Conrado et al.
Licence
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
Cite this article
Conrado AC, Arruda H, Stanton D, James SW, Kille P, Brown G, Silva ED, Dupont L, Taheri S, Morgan AJ, Simoes N, Rodrigues A, Montiel R, Cunha L. 2017. The complete mitochondrial DNA sequence of the pantropical earthworm Pontoscolex corethrurus (Rhinodrilidae, Clitellata): Mitogenome characterization and phylogenetic positioning. PeerJ Preprints 5:e2847v1

Abstract

Pontoscolex corethrurus (Müller, 1857) plays an important role in soil terrestrial ecosystems and has been widely used as an animal model for a large variety of ecological studies, in particular due to its common presence and generally high abundance in human-disturbed tropical soils. In this study we describe the complete mitochondrial genome of the peregrine earthworm Pontoscolex corethrurus. This is the first record of a mitochondrial genome within the Rhinodrilidae family. Its mitochondrial genome is 14 835 bp in length containing 37 genes (13 protein-coding genes (PCG), 2 rRNA genes and 22 tRNA genes). It has the same gene content and structure as in other sequenced earthworms, but unusual among invertebrates it has several overlapping open reading frames. All genes are encoded on the same strand, most of the PCGs use ATG as the start codon except for NAD3, which uses GTG as the start codon. The T+A content of the mitochondrial genome is 59.9% (31.9% A, 27.9% T, 14.9% G, and 25.3% for C). The annotated genome sequence has been deposited in GenBank under the accession number KT988053.

Author Comment

In our communication, we provide the complete sequence of the mitochondrial genome of the peregrine earthworm Pontoscolex corethrurus. This could be a very valuable tool for the study of evolutionary and phylogenetic relations in Annelida, in particular, because this is the first mitogenome to be sequenced for a Rhinodrilidae family member. This paper is currently submitted to a peer review journal.

Supplemental Information

Supplementary Figure 1

Cloverleaf structure of the 22 inferred tRNAs in the mitogenome of Pontoscolex corethrurus

DOI: 10.7287/peerj.preprints.2847v1/supp-1