The first homosporous lycophyte genome revealed the association between the dynamic accumulation of LTR-RTs and genome size variation

Lycophytes and euphyllophytes (ferns and seed plants) are the two surviving lineages of vascular plants. The modern lycophytes (clubmosses) are herbaceous found either heterosporous (Isoetales and Selaginellales) or homosporous (Lycopodiales). The contrasting genome size between homosporous and heterosporous plants has long been an attractive topic. Most clubmosses are the resource plants of Huperzine A (HupA) which is invaluable for treating Alzheimer’s disease, but the evolutionary trajectory of which in land plants is unexplored. To better understand these fundamental questions, the genome data of a homosporous lycophyte is urgently required. We generated the Lycopodium clavatum L. genome by applying a reformed pipeline for filtering out non-plant sequences. The obtained genome size is 2.30 Gb, distinguished in more than 85% repetitive elements of which 62% is LTR. Two whole genome duplications (WGDs) are rigorously detected. The content of LTR-RTs was more than ten times higher in homosporous lycophytes than heterosporous ones, although most appeared within one Mya. Then, we find that the LTR-RTs’ birth-death mode (a much greater birth and extremely slower death) contributes the accumulation of LTR-RTs resulting homosporous lycophyte genome expansion, while in heterosporous lycophytes, the mode is exactly the opposite. Furthermore, the five necessary enzymes of the HupA biosynthetic pathway were identified in the L. clavatum genome, but absent in the other land plants. This decoded genome data will be a key cornerstone to elucidating the fundamental aspects of lycophyte biology and land plant evolution.