title: Evolution of carbonic anhydrase in C4 plants.
abstract: During the evolution of C4 photosynthesis, the intracellular location with most carbonic anhydrase (CA) activity has changed. In Flaveria, the loss of the sequence encoding a chloroplast transit peptide from an ancestral C3 CA ortholog confined the C4 isoform to the mesophyll cell cytosol. Recent studies indicate that sequence elements and histone modifications controlling the expression of C4-associated CAs were likely present in the C3 ancestral chromatin, enabling the evolution of the C4 pathway. Almost complete abolishment of maize CA activity yields no obvious phenotype at ambient CO2 levels. This contrasts with results for Flaveria CA mutants, and has opened discussion on the role of CA in the C4 carbon concentrating mechanism.
authors.affiliation: School of Chemistry and Biochemistry [310], University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, Western Australia 6009, Australia. Electronic address: martha.ludwig@uwa.edu.au.
authors.forename: Martha
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ludwig
mesh_terms: D002245:Carbon Dioxide / Q000378:metabolism; D002256:Carbonic Anhydrases / Q000378:metabolism*; D002736:Chloroplasts / Q000378:metabolism; D019143:Evolution, Molecular; D037142:Flaveria / Q000201:enzymology / Q000378:metabolism; D006657:Histones / Q000378:metabolism; D003313:Zea mays / Q000201:enzymology / Q000378:metabolism
chemical_list: D006657:Histones; D002245:Carbon Dioxide; D002256:Carbonic Anhydrases