Plant centromeres - how can they originate and evolve?

Centromere is place on the chromosome, which is crucial for the even distribution of genetic information during cell division. Usually it comprises a limited area visible by light-microscope as the constriction of chromosome. However, there are also cases where this constriction is not visible and many separate “centromeres” are distributed equally alongside whole chromosome. Transient, yet unknown type of centromere was discovered by IPMB scientists in pea plants. Another study, carried out on potato plants in collaboration with institutions abroad, showed that newly formed centromeres can further evolve rapidly. The findings were published in prestigious journals the PLoS Genetics and the Plant Cell.

• Neumann Pavel, Navrátilová Alice, Schroeder-Reiter E., Koblížková Andrea, Steinbauerová Veronika, Chocholová Eva, Novák Petr, Wanner G., Macas Jiří: Stretching the Rules: Monocentric Chromosomes with Multiple Centromere Domains. PLoS Genetics 8(6): e1002777, 2012.http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgen.1002777
• Gong Z., Wu Y., Koblížková Andrea, Torres G.A., Wang K., Iovene M., Neumann Pavel, Zhang W., Novák Petr,/b>, Buell C.R., Macas Jiří, Jiang J.: Repeatless and repeat-based centromeres in potato: implications for centromere evolution. Plant Cell 24(9): 3559-3574, 2012.http://dx.doi.org/10.1105/tpc.112.100511