bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.01.12.426341; this version posted January 18, 2021. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under aCC-BY-NC 4.0 International license. G´omez-P´erezand Kemen RESEARCH Predicting lifestyle and host from positive selection data and genome properties in oomycetes Daniel G´omez-P´erez* and Eric Kemen *Correspondence: daniel.gomez-
[email protected] Abstract Zentrum f¨urMolekularbiologie der Pflanzen, Auf der Morgenstelle 32, Background: Host and niche shifts are a source of genomic and phenotypic 72076 T¨ubingen,Germany diversification as evidenced in parasitism. Most characteristic is core metabolism Full list of author information is available at the end of the article reduction as parasites adapt to a particular host, while the accessory genome often maintains a high degree of diversification. However, selective pressures acting on the genome of such organisms are not fully understood. Results: Here, we developed a comparative genomic approach to study underlying adaptive trends in oomycetes, a eukaryote phylum with a broad range of economically important plant and animal parasitic lifestyles. Our analysis reveals converging evolution on biological processes for oomycetes inhabiting similar niches. We find that certain functions, in particular carbohydrate metabolism, transport, and signaling, are important for host and environmental adaption in oomycetes. Discussion: Given the high correlation of lifestyle to genome properties in our oomycete dataset and the convergent evolution of fungal and oomycete genomes, we have developed a model that predicts plant pathogen lifestyles with high accuracy.