A robust two-gene oscillator at the core of Ostreococcus tauri circadian clock

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that Ostreococcus tauri's circadian clock is driven by a simple, robust two-gene oscillator that remains unaffected by natural light fluctuations, based on experimental and mathematical analysis.

Contribution

It provides evidence for a minimal two-gene core oscillator in Ostreococcus tauri's circadian clock, highlighting its robustness to environmental light changes.

Findings

Existence of a simple two-gene oscillator in Ostreococcus tauri

Clock dynamics are unaffected by natural daylight fluctuations

Mathematical analysis supports the robustness of the core oscillator

Abstract

The microscopic green alga Ostreococcus tauri is rapidly emerging as a promising model organism in the green lineage. In particular, recent results by Corellou et al. [Plant Cell, 21, 3436 (2009)] and Thommen et al. [PLoS Comput. Biol. 6, e1000990 (2010)] strongly suggest that its circadian clock is a simplified version of Arabidopsis thaliana clock, and that it is architectured so as to be robust to natural daylight fluctuations. In this work, we analyze time series data from luminescent reporters for the two central clock genes TOC1 and CCA1 and correlate them with microarray data previously analyzed. Our mathematical analysis strongly supports both the existence of a simple two-gene oscillator at the core of Ostreococcus tauri clock and the fact that its dynamics is not affected by light in normal entrainment conditions, a signature of its robustness.