Secondary structure model for the ITS-2 precursor rRNA of strongyloid nematodes of equids: implications for phylogenetic inference

In order to maximise the positional homology in the primary sequence alignment of the second internal transcribed spacer for 30 species of equine strongyloid nematodes, the secondary structures of the precursor ribosomal RNA were predicted using an approach combining an energy minimisation method and comparative sequence analysis. The results indicated that a common secondary structure model of the second internal transcribed spacer of these nematodes was maintained, despite significant interspecific differences (2–56%) in primary sequences. The secondary structure model was then used to refine the primary second internal transcribed spacer sequence alignment. The “manual” and “structure” alignments were both subjected to phylogenetic analysis using three different tree-building methods to compare the effect of using different sequence alignments on phylogenetic inference. The topologies of the phylogenetic trees inferred from the manual second internal transcribed spacer alignment were usually different to those derived from the structure second internal transcribed spacer alignment. The results suggested that the positional homology in the second internal transcribed spacer primary sequence alignment was maximised when the secondary structure model was taken into consideration.