Arf and Rab family small GTPases and their regulators, GTPase-activating proteins (GAPs) and guanine nucleotide exchange factors (GEFs), play a central role in membrane trafficking. In this study, we focused on a recently reported GAP for Arf (and potentially Rab) proteins, the CSW complex, a part of a small family of longin domain-containing proteins that form complexes with GAP activity. This family also includes folliculin and GATOR1, which are GAPs for the Rag/Gtr GTPases. All three complexes are associated with lysosomes and play a role in nutrient signaling, the latter two being directly involved in the mTOR pathway. The role of CSW is not clear, but in addition to having GAP activity on Arf proteins in vitro, its mutation causes severe neurodegenerative diseases. Here we update the reported pan-eukaryotic presence of folliculin and GATOR1, and demonstrate that CSW is also found throughout eukaryotes, though with sporadic distribution. We identify highly conserved motifs in all CSW subunits, some shared with the catalytic subunits of folliculin and GATOR1, that provide new potential avenues for experimental exploration. Remarkably, one such conserved sequence, the "GP" motif, is also found in structurally related longin proteins present in the archaeal ancestor of eukaryotes.

• Keywords
• Arf GTPases, DENN domain, GTPase‐activating proteins, LECA, molecular phylogenetics, nutrient signaling, pan‐eukaryotic homology search, structural modeling,
• MeSH
• Humans MeSH
• Monomeric GTP-Binding Proteins * metabolism   MeSH
• Protein Domains MeSH
• GTPase-Activating Proteins * metabolism   genetics   chemistry   MeSH
• Guanine Nucleotide Exchange Factors metabolism   MeSH
• Animals MeSH
• Check Tag
• Humans MeSH
• Animals MeSH
• Publication type
• Journal Article MeSH
• Names of Substances
• Monomeric GTP-Binding Proteins * MeSH
• GTPase-Activating Proteins * MeSH
• Guanine Nucleotide Exchange Factors MeSH

The notion that mitochondria cannot be lost was shattered with the report of an oxymonad Monocercomonoides exilis, the first eukaryote arguably without any mitochondrion. Yet, questions remain about whether this extends beyond the single species and how this transition took place. The Oxymonadida is a group of gut endobionts taxonomically housed in the Preaxostyla which also contains free-living flagellates of the genera Trimastix and Paratrimastix. The latter two taxa harbour conspicuous mitochondrion-related organelles (MROs). Here we report high-quality genome and transcriptome assemblies of two Preaxostyla representatives, the free-living Paratrimastix pyriformis and the oxymonad Blattamonas nauphoetae. We performed thorough comparisons among all available genomic and transcriptomic data of Preaxostyla to further decipher the evolutionary changes towards amitochondriality, endobiosis, and unstacked Golgi. Our results provide insights into the metabolic and endomembrane evolution, but most strikingly the data confirm the complete loss of mitochondria for all three oxymonad species investigated (M. exilis, B. nauphoetae, and Streblomastix strix), suggesting the amitochondriate status is common to a large part if not the whole group of Oxymonadida. This observation moves this unique loss to 100 MYA when oxymonad lineage diversified.

• MeSH
• Eukaryota * genetics   MeSH
• Phylogeny MeSH
• Genomics MeSH
• Mitochondria genetics   MeSH
• Oxymonadida * genetics   metabolism   MeSH
• Publication type
• Journal Article MeSH