Nonphotosynthetic, parasitic plant found growing on the roots of beech tree. Epifagus virginiana

Epifagus virginiana, commonly called "Beech-Drops", is a parasitic flowering plant found growing in woods on the roots of beech tree. It is a small, nonphotosynthetic plant, that grows upto 20 inches in height. It has brown or yellowish branches that lack real leaves but have scales without any chlorophyll. Flowers are yellowish, reddish, or brown. They Bloom from late summer and continue into mid fall. It is a native North American plant. The plastid genome of Epifagus virginiana has been completely sequenced. The genome is 70,028 bp in size which is one third the size of tobacco plastid. It contains only 42 genes, 38 of which specify components of the gene-expression apparatus of the plastid. The reduction in size is thought to be due to hundreds or thousands of small, independent deletions. The order of remnant genes is, the same as in intact chloroplasts. It lacks all genes for photosynthesis and chlororespiration found in chloroplast genomes of green plants. It therefore makes an interseting system to study organelle genome whose primary function of photosynthesis is lost but has still remained active through the evolutionary process.