title: Horizontal gene transfer in plants.
abstract: Horizontal gene transfer (HGT) describes the transmission of genetic material across species boundaries. HGT often occurs in microbic and eukaryotic genomes. However, the pathways by which HGTs occur in multicellular eukaryotes, especially in plants, are not well understood. We systematically summarized more than ten possible pathways for HGT. The intimate contact which frequently occurs in parasitism, symbiosis, pathogen, epiphyte, entophyte, and grafting interactions could promote HGTs between two species. Besides these direct transfer methods, genes can be exchanged with a vector as a bridge: possible vectors include pollen, fungi, bacteria, viruses, viroids, plasmids, transposons, and insects. HGT, especially when involving horizontal transfer of transposable elements, is recognized as a significant force propelling genomic variation and biological innovation, playing an important functional and evolutionary role in both eukaryotic and prokaryotic genomes. We proposed possible mechanisms by which HGTs can occur, which is useful in understanding the genetic information exchange among distant species or distant cellular components.
authors.affiliation: Engineering Research Center of South Upland Agriculture, Ministry of Education, Southwest University, Chongqing, People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Caihua
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Gao
authors.forename: Xiaodong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Ren
authors.forename: Annaliese S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Mason
authors.forename: Honglei
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Meili
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.forename: Jiana
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: Donghui
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Fu
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001419:Bacteria / Q000235:genetics; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D005658:Fungi / Q000235:genetics; D022761:Gene Transfer, Horizontal; D054884:Host-Pathogen Interactions / Q000235:genetics; D007313:Insecta / Q000235:genetics; D010944:Plants / Q000235:genetics* / Q000382:microbiology / Q000469:parasitology / Q000821:virology; D018087:Plastids / Q000235:genetics; D014780:Viruses / Q000235:genetics
chemical_list: D004251:DNA Transposable Elements