Advances on the genome of algae

Algae possess complex and diverse biology and evolutionary history. They play an important role in the ecosystem. A mass of unique genes and biological processes also make them attractive. The application of high-throughput sequencing approaches to algal research has greatly contributed to the development of algal genomics and transcriptomics, as well as enriched the gene information of algae. In this article, we summarize the advances of algal genomics and transcriptomics, describe and compare the characteristics of different algae genomes, and introduce the application of expression sequence tags (ESTs), microarray and RNA sequencing technique to algal transcriptomics research. Furthermore, the advances of algal gene expression and small RNA are also reviewed in detail. At last, we discuss the challenges and future development of this area.