Caenorhabditis briggsae
Roundworm
Habitat
Caenorhabditis briggsae is a small, free-living, nematode that, like its close and more famous relative C. elegans, is found in nutrient- and microorganism-rich habitats such as in compost, mushroom beds and garden soil where it feeds on bacteria. It has been isolated from soil in temperate regions around the world. It has been found in association with other closely related species. Since their habitats are essentially identical, C. briggsae is sometimes found co-occurring with C. elegans and C. remanei. Also like C. elegans, C. briggsae has been found associated with other invertebrates like snails, probably using their host as a form of transportation to new food sources.
Biology
When inspected side-by-side, C. briggsae and C. elegans are almost indistinquishable, even though they diverged from their last common ancestor approximately 100 million years ago. C. briggsae shares many of the same features that have made C. elegans a model organism for the study of genetics, as developmental biology, neurobiology, cell biology and behavior: it is easy to maintain in the laboratory, has a short generation time, an invariant anatomy and transparent body.
Again, like C. elegans, the C. briggsae embryo goes through four larval stages before becoming a mature adult. Each larval stage looks similar to the adult, only smaller. C. briggsae can adapt an alternative life form, call a dauer larva, in response to overcrowding or the absence of adequate food supply. This dauer larva can remain viable for as long as three months, while it roams around in search of food. It is this dauer larvae that is the most common form of C. briggsae found in the wild.
The adult is a self-fertilizing hermaphrodite, meaning it is both a male and female. When it first becomes and adult it is a male, which produces sperm that it then stores. Next, it becomes a female and produces eggs, which are then fertilized by the stored sperm.
C. briggsae's genome is slightly larger than C. elegans' (104 Mb for briggsae vs. 100 Mb for elegans). It is slightly larger than C. elegans', but 30 times smaller than the human genome. The genome encodes ~22,000 proteins.
Sequencing Plan
A high-quality draft genome sequence, estimated to cover 98% of the C. briggsae genome, has been completed. That sequence and a comparison to the C. elegans' genome were published in 2004. The National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), National Institutes of Health (NIH), provided the funding for sequencing the C. briggsae genome.
Contacts
| Name | Affiliation |
|---|---|
| John Spieth | The Genome Institute, Washington University School of Medicine |
Sequences & Maps
Assemblies
| Name | Date | Description | Blast DBs |
| Caenorhabditis_briggsae-1.0 (Cb3) | Jan 18, 2007 | Chromosomal AGPs | chromosomes |
Maps
| Name | Date | Type | Description |
| Caenorhabditis briggsae | Sep 01, 2005 | Physical | FPC |
Related Links
Sequence Data
Genome Browser
Others
Publications
Parkinson J, Mitreva M, Hall N, Blaxter M, McCarter JP.
400000 nematode ESTs on the Net.
Trends Parasitol. 2003 Jul;19(7):283-6. PubMed | View Abstract
McCarter, J., P. Abad, J. T. Jones, and D. Bird.
Rapid Gene Discovery in Plant Parasitic Nematodes Via Expressed Sequence Tags
Nematology, 2(7):719-731. Link | View Abstract
Harris TW, Chen N, Cunningham F, Tello-Ruiz M, Antoshechkin I, Bastiani C, Bieri T, Blasiar…
WormBase: a multi-species resource for nematode biology and genomics.
Nucleic Acids Res. 2004 Jan 1;32 Database issue:D411-7. PubMed | View Abstract
Harris TW, Lee R, Schwarz E, Bradnam K, Lawson D, Chen W, Blasier D, Kenny…
WormBase: a cross-species database for comparative genomics.
Nucleic Acids Res. 2003 Jan 1;31(1):133-7. PubMed | View Abstract
Streit A, Li W, Robertson B, Schein J, Kamal IH, Marra M, Wood WB.
Homologs of the Caenorhabditis elegans masculinizing gene her-1 in C. briggsae and the filarial parasite Brugia malayi.
Genetics. 1999 Aug;152(4):1573-84. PubMed | View Abstract
Wylie T, Martin JC, Dante M, Mitreva MD, Clifton SW, Chinwalla A, Waterston RH, Wilson…
Nematode.net: a tool for navigating sequences from parasitic and free-living nematodes.
Nucleic Acids Res. 2004 Jan 1;32 Database issue:D423-6. PubMed | View Abstract
Stein LD, Bao Z, Blasiar D, Blumenthal T, Brent MR, Chen N, Chinwalla A, Clarke…
The Genome Sequence of Caenorhabditis briggsae: A Platform for Comparative Genomics.
PLoS Biol. 2003 Nov;1(2):E45. Epub 2003 Nov 17. PubMed | View Abstract
