Evolution of the eukaryotic membrane-trafficking system: origin, tempo and mode

The emergence of an endomembrane system was a crucial stage in the prokaryote-to-eukaryote evolutionary transition. Recent genomic and molecular evolutionary analyses have provided insight into how this critical system arrived at its modern configuration. The apparent relative absence of prokaryotic antecedents for the endomembrane machinery contrasts with the situation for mitochondria, plastids and the nucleus. Overall, the evidence suggests an autogenous origin for the eukaryotic membrane-trafficking machinery. The emerging picture is that early eukaryotic ancestors had a complex endomembrane system, which implies that this cellular system evolved relatively rapidly after the proto-eukaryote diverged away from the other prokaryotic lines. Many of the components of the trafficking system are the result of gene duplications that have produced proteins that have similar functions but differ in their subcellular location. A proto-eukaryote possessing a very simple trafficking system could thus have evolved to near modern complexity in the last common eukaryotic ancestor (LCEA) via paralogous gene family expansion of the proteins encoding organelle identity. The descendents of this common ancestor have undergone further modification of the trafficking machinery; unicellular simplicity and multicellular complexity are the prevailing trend, but there are some remarkable counter-examples.