In addition to mbhA, several intercellular genes (including asgA and popC) Selleckchem AZD2014 appear to have been subject to HGT (Goldman et al., 2007), but all of the intracellular pathway genes assessed by Goldman et al. (2007) seem to have evolved vertically. Firstly, on average, intercellular genes have more severe phenotypes upon deletion than intracellular genes (Fig. 2), producing approximately fivefold fewer spores (14% and 72% of wild-type sporulation, respectively). Secondly, intracellular genes are more variable than intercellular genes, as manifested

by lower mean percentage identities and similarities when aligned against their orthologues in S. aurantiaca (67% identity and 78% similarity compared with 77% identity and 85% similarity, respectively). There is a medium strength correlation (ρ=0.374) between percentage identity and percentage of wild-type sporulation. Developmental timers

and nutrient sensors also differ quantifiably. Developmental timers have a small average effect on spore yield upon deletion (117% of wild-type sporulation) and high sequence variability (61% identity and 75% similarity to S. aurantiaca orthologues), whereas nutrient sensors have relatively severe effects on deletion (44% of wild-type sporulation) and exhibit reduced NU7441 in vitro sequence variability (72% identity and 81% similarity to their S. aurantiaca orthologues), as can be seen in Fig. 2. Intracellular pathway genes were found on average to lie only 1374 coding sequences (CDSs) from the origin (17.3% of the genome), while the mean for intercellular pathway genes was 2106 CDSs (27.0% mafosfamide of the genome). The average for all genes in the genome is 1879 CDSs (25% of the genome). Developmental timer genes were found to lie particularly close to the origin (mean 628 CDSs, 7.8% of the genome), while nutrient sensor genes averaged 1891 CDSs from the origin (23.6% of the genome). Genomic location and sequence conservation (percentage identity) exhibit a medium strength correlation (ρ=0.428), while the genomic location and severity of a phenotype are strongly correlated (ρ=0.651). Student’s two-sample t-tests (not assuming

equal variance) lent highly significant support (P<0.05 in all cases) to the proposal that the intercellular and intracellular genes assessed had been sampled from discrete populations, whether assessing percentage identity, percentage similarity, distance from origin or severity of phenotype. Statistically significant correlations were also observed between genomic location, sequence conservation and severity of phenotype (reported above), and correlation coefficients were of a similar magnitude whether derived from parametric or nonparametric (Spearman) tests of correlation. Further support for categorization on the basis of a mechanistic role (intercellular vs. intracellular, and nutrient sensor vs. developmental timer) was also obtained from a variety of nonparametric tests, including Mann–Whitney U-tests (P<0.