Two genomes in one mitochondrion: mitochondrial heteroplasmy and mitogenome dynamics in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii

Widespread mitochondrial structural heteroplasmy in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii is linked to two mitogenome configurations, including a 19-kb form with 4,001-bp terminal inverted repeats.

• Why it matters: The classical 15.8-kb linear mitogenome model is incomplete because conventional assembly approaches can miss alternative structures and telomere-like features.
• What they did: Using high-accuracy long-read sequencing and single-molecule profiling, the study mapped a dynamic network of multimeric mitochondrial DNA concatemers bridged by a conserved 17-bp motif.
• The result: NUMTs required careful assay design, and configuration-specific digital PCR across the CC-5325 lineage and additional field-isolated strains showed substantial variation in the relative abundance of the two configurations.

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