Smallest and largest known genomes

Range black-chinned hummingbird (Archilochus alexanderi) 0.91: common ostrich (Struthio camelus) ~1.3 Gb
Organism Birds
Reference Zhang G et al., Comparative genomics reveals insights into avian genome evolution and adaptation. Science. 2014 Dec 12 346(6215):1311-20. doi: 10.1126/science.1251385 p.1312 left column top paragraphPubMed ID25504712
Primary Source [21] T. R. Gregory, in The Animal Genome Size Database (2005) available at www.genomesize.com.
Comments P.1312 left column top paragraph: "Broad patterns of avian genome evolution: Although many fishes and some amphibians have smaller genomes than birds, among amniotes, birds have the smallest (primary source). The genomes of mammals and nonavian reptiles typically range from 1.0 to 8.2 Gb, whereas avian genomes range from 0.91 in the black-chinned hummingbird (Archilochus alexanderi) to a little over 1.3 Gb in the common ostrich (primary source). A number of hypotheses have been proposed for the smaller avian genome size (refs 25–28). Here, [investigators] document key events that have likely contributed to this smaller genome size."
Entered by Uri M
ID 117104