Coelho Susana M, Scornet Delphine, Rousvoal Sylvie, Peters Nick T, Dartevelle Laurence, Peters Akira F, Cock J Mark
UPMC Université Paris 06, The Marine Plants and Biomolecules Laboratory, UMR 7139, Station Biologique de Roscoff, BP74, 29682 Roscoff Cedex, France.
Cold Spring Harb Protoc. 2012 Feb 1;2012(2):193-8. doi: 10.1101/pdb.emo065821.
The brown algae are an interesting group of organisms from several points of view. They are the dominant organisms in many coastal ecosystems, where they often form large, underwater forests. They also have an unusual evolutionary history, being members of the stramenopiles, which are very distantly related to well-studied animal and green plant models. As a consequence of this history, brown algae have evolved many novel features, for example in terms of their cell biology and metabolic pathways. They are also one of only a small number of eukaryotic groups to have independently evolved complex multicellularity. Despite these interesting features, the brown algae have remained a relatively poorly studied group. This situation has started to change over the last few years, however, with the emergence of the filamentous brown alga Ectocarpus as a model system that is amenable to the genomic and genetic approaches that have proved to be so powerful in more classical model organisms such as Drosophila and Arabidopsis.
从多个角度来看，褐藻都是一类有趣的生物。它们是许多沿海生态系统中的优势生物，常常在水下形成大片森林。它们还拥有不同寻常的进化史，属于不等鞭毛类，与经过充分研究的动物和绿色植物模式生物的亲缘关系非常远。由于这段进化史，褐藻演化出了许多新奇的特征，比如在细胞生物学和代谢途径方面。它们也是仅有的少数独立演化出复杂多细胞性的真核生物类群之一。尽管有这些有趣的特征，但褐藻仍然是一个研究相对较少的类群。不过，在过去几年里，随着丝状褐藻——海带属成为一种模式系统，这种情况开始发生变化。海带属适合采用基因组学和遗传学方法，而这些方法在果蝇和拟南芥等更经典的模式生物中已被证明非常有效。
