Transposon-mediated telomere destabilization: a driver of genome evolution in the blast fungus

We hypothesize that the subtelomere regions are the main factories of fungal genome evolution, where recurrent bouts of telomere crisis provide the fuel for raw materials recruitment and telomere rescue pathways act to generate novel sequences. Furthermore, we suspect that enhanced rates of nucleotide substitution/indel polymorphism in the subtelomeric regions may further accelerate the neo-functionalization of captured sequences.The overall goal of this project is to gain an improved understanding of subtelomere-internal genome sequence exchange, as it relates to fungal genome structure and niche adaptation. Specific objectives include: 1. Characterize the structural and genic diversity of Pyricularia (syn. Magnaporthe) oryzae chromosome ends; 2. Assess the impact of telomere dynamics on genome evolution; 3. Examine genome reorganization following spontaneous or experimentally-induced telomere crisis events.