Highlights•Many bacteria have multicellular lifecycle phases, falling into three broad
categories.•Predation, nutrient scarcity, and environmental variability may have led to …

Traditionally recognized as environmental bacteria, Planctomycetes have just been linked
recently to human pathology as opportunistic pathogens, arousing a great interest for clinical …

Planctomycetes are intriguing microorganisms that apparently lack peptidoglycan, a
structure that controls the shape and integrity of almost all bacterial cells. Therefore, the …

Phagocytosis is a key eukaryotic feature, conserved from unicellular protists to animals, that
enabled eukaryotes to feed on other organisms. It could also be a driving force behind …

The phylum Planctomycetes comprises bacteria with uncommon features among
prokaryotes, such as cell division by budding, absence of the bacterial tubulin-homolog cell …

The mechanistic evolutionary origin of the eukaryotic cell nucleus remains unknown. Among
several plausible hypotheses, the most controversial is that large DNA viruses, such as …

Cytochromes c (Cytc) are widespread electron transfer proteins and important enzymes in
the global nitrogen and sulfur cycles. The distribution of Cytc in more than 300 archaeal …

Bacteria from the Planctomycetes, Verrucomicrobia, and Chlamydiae (PVC) superphylum
are exceptions to the otherwise dominant mode of division by binary fission, which is based …

Major evolutionary transitions as well as the evolution of codes of life are key elements in
macroevolution which are characterized by increase in complexity Major evolutionary …

The discovery of new bioactive compounds is an invaluable aid to the development of new
drugs. Strategies for finding novel molecules can focus on the exploitation of less studied …