Reductive evolution of chloroplasts in non-photosynthetic plants, algae and protists

Chloroplasts are generally known as eukaryotic organelles whose main function is photosynthesis. They perform other functions, however, such as synthesizing isoprenoids, fatty acids, heme, iron sulphur clusters and other essential compounds. In non-photosynthetic lineages that possess plastids, the chloroplast genomes have been reduced and most (or all) photosynthetic genes have been lost. Consequently, non-photosynthetic plastids have also been...