Guanine plus cytosine (GC) content among species

Range 17 - 75 %
Organism bacteria
Reference Lind PA, Andersson DI. Whole-genome mutational biases in bacteria. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2008 Nov 18 105(46):17878-83. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0804445105. p.17878 left column 2nd paragraphPubMed ID19001264
Primary Source [1] Hallin PF, Ussery DW (2004) CBS Genome Atlas Database: A dynamic storage for bioinformatic results and sequence data. Bioinformatics 20: 3682–3686.PubMed ID15256401
Comments P.17878 left column 2nd paragraph: "A central question in evolutionary genomics is what mechanisms cause the variation observed in DNA base composition between and within genomes and how rapidly and by what mechanisms these biases might change in response to, for example, altered ecology and genetic constitution of the organism. The large range in guanine plus cytosine (GC) content among bacterial species is well established, varying between at least 17% and 75% GC, with an even larger variation in the third codon position (primary source). Within a genome, GC content usually is quite homogeneous and has a strong phylogenetic signal, but despite this overall homogeneity, there frequently exist strand-specific biases between the two strands of DNA such that the average nucleotide composition deviates from the theoretically expected A=T and G=C within each strand."
Entered by Uri M
ID 112671