Expression of matK: functional and evolutionary implications

Strong phylogenetic signal from matK has rendered it an invaluable gene in plant systematic and evolutionary studies at various evolutionary depths. Further, matK is proposed as the only chloroplast‐encoded group II intron maturase, thus implicating MATK in chloroplast posttranscriptional processing. For a protein‐coding gene, matK has an unusual evolutionary mode and tempo, including relatively high substitution rates at both the nucleotide and...