Preprint Article Version 1 Preserved in Portico This version is not peer-reviewed

Combining Nanopore and Illumina Sequencing Permits Detailed Analysis of Insertion Mutations and Structural Variations Produced by PEG-Mediated Transformation in Ostreococcus tauri

Version 1 : Received: 22 February 2021 / Approved: 23 February 2021 / Online: 23 February 2021 (09:37:10 CET)

A peer-reviewed article of this Preprint also exists.

Thomy, J.; Sanchez, F.; Gut, M.; Cruz, F.; Alioto, T.; Piganeau, G.; Grimsley, N.; Yau, S. Combining Nanopore and Illumina Sequencing Permits Detailed Analysis of Insertion Mutations and Structural Variations Produced by PEG-Mediated Transformation in Ostreococcus tauri. Cells 2021, 10, 664. Thomy, J.; Sanchez, F.; Gut, M.; Cruz, F.; Alioto, T.; Piganeau, G.; Grimsley, N.; Yau, S. Combining Nanopore and Illumina Sequencing Permits Detailed Analysis of Insertion Mutations and Structural Variations Produced by PEG-Mediated Transformation in Ostreococcus tauri. Cells 2021, 10, 664.

Abstract

Ostreococcus tauri is a simple unicellular green alga representing an ecologically important group of phytoplankton in oceans worldwide. Modern molecular techniques must be developed in order to understand the mechanisms that permit adaptation of microalgae to their environment. We present for the first time in O. tauri a detailed characterization of individual genomic integration events of foreign DNA of plasmid origin after PEG-mediated transformation. Vector integration appears to be random, occurring mainly at a single locus, and thus confirming the utility of this technique for insertional mutagenesis. While the mechanism of double-stranded DNA repair in the O. tauri model remains to be elucidated, we clearly demonstrate by genome resequencing that the integration of the vector leads to frequent structural variations (deletions/insertions and duplications) and some chromosomal rearrangements in the genome at the insertion loci, and often within the vector sequence itself. From these observations, we speculate that a non-homologous end joining-like mechanism is required during random insertion events, as described in plants and other freshwater algal models. PEG-mediated transformation is therefore a promising molecular biology tool, not only for functional genomic studies, but also for biotechnological research in ecologically important marine algae.

Keywords

Mamiellophyceae; Chlorophyta; polyethylene glycol; copy number; random insertional mutagenesis; unknown sequences; structural variations; DNA repair; NHEJ; NGS

Subject

Biology and Life Sciences, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

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