The appearance of photosynthetic eukaryotes (algae and plants) dramatically altered the Earth's ecosystem, making possible all vertebrate life on land, including humans. Dating algal origin is, however, frustrated by a meager fossil record. We generated a plastid multi-gene phylogeny with Bayesian inference and then used maximum likelihood molecular clock methods to estimate algal divergence times. The plastid tree was used as a surrogate for algal host evolution because of recent phylogenetic evidence supporting the vertical ancestry of the plastid in the red, green, and glaucophyte algae. Nodes in the plastid tree were constrained with six reliable fossil dates and a maximum age of 3,500 MYA based on the earliest known eubacterial fossil. Our analyses support an ancient (late Paleoproterozoic) origin of photosynthetic eukaryotes with the primary endosymbiosis that gave rise to the first alga having occurred after the split of the Plantae (i.e., red, green, and glaucophyte algae plus land plants) from the opisthokonts sometime before 1,558 MYA. The split of the red and green algae is calculated to have occurred about 1,500 MYA, and the putative single red algal secondary endosymbiosis that gave rise to the plastid in the cryptophyte, haptophyte, and stramenopile algae (chromists) occurred about 1,300 MYA. These dates, which are consistent with fossil evidence for putative marine algae (i.e., acritarchs) from the early Mesoproterozoic (1,500 MYA) and with a major eukaryotic diversification in the very late Mesoproterozoic and Neoproterozoic, provide a molecular timeline for understanding algal evolution.

White Rot Fungi (WRF) are a class of microorganisms widely understood for their ability to breakdown an extensive range of pollutants generally found in industrial wastewater. This specific literature review centers on the abilities of the White Rot Fungi to treat industrial wastewater, analysis of the biodegradation mechanism, future applications, and scaling up for practical implementation. WRF usually carry out the degradation process with ligninolytic enzyme by targeting complex industrial pollutants, such as aromatic hydrocarbons, dyes, pharmaceuticals, and products of personal care. The unique enzymatic system of WRF converts the complex and harmful industrial pollutants into harmless end and byproducts, thus minimizing the impact on the environment and ecosystem. This review paper also discusses the potential applications of WRF, such as bioremediation, biosorption, and co-culturing with bacteria to enhance the pollutants removal efficiency of already functional wastewater treatment plants. However, there are still challenges in scaling up WRF-based treatment facilities due to factors such as the optimization of conditions and processes of already functional conventional wastewater treatment plants, cost effectiveness, and design modifications of treatment facilities. Conclusively, WRF fungi can play an important role in degrading complex organic and inorganic pollutants specifically, which are not usually treated by conventional wastewater treatment plants.

During the last year, science has been focusing on the research of antivirally active compounds overall after the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, which caused a great amount of deaths and the downfall of the economy in 2020. Photosynthetic organisms such as microalgae are known to be a reservoir of bioactive secondary metabolites; this feature, coupled with the possibility of achieving very high biomass levels without excessive energetic expenses, make microalgae worthy of attention in the search for new molecules with antiviral effects. In this work, the antiviral effects of microalgae against some common human or animal viruses were considered, focusing our attention on some possible effects against SARS-CoV-2. We summed up the data from the literature on microalgae antiviral compounds, from the most common ones, such as lectins, polysaccharides and photosynthetic pigments, to the less known ones, such as unidentified proteins. We have discussed the effects of a microalgae-based genetic engineering approach against some viral diseases. We have illustrated the potential antiviral benefits of a diet enriched in microalgae.