Prochloron
Prochloron and the Greek chloros is a unicellular oxygenic photosynthetic prokaryote commonly found as an extracellular symbiont on coral reefs, particularly in didemnid ascidians. Part of the phylum cyanobacteria, it was theorized that Prochloron is a predecessor of the photosynthetic components, chloroplasts, found in photosynthetic eukaryotic cells. However this theory is largely refuted by phylogenetic studies which indicate Prochloron is not on the same line of descent that lead to chloroplast-containing algae and land plants.
Prochloron was discovered in 1975 by Ralph A. Lewin of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Prochloron is one of three known prochlorophytes, cyanobacteria that contain both chlorophyll a and b bound to a special light-harvesting protein.Species
The only taxonomically valid species is P. didemni.
