Plants without chloroplasts or their genomes?

Perhaps the introductory biology class concept of plant cells as eukaryotes with chloroplasts is being defied, as Rappler writer KD Suarez points out in this article posted on rappler.com, a new social media that focuses on news.

This image, borrowed from a BBC KS3 Bitesize Science article, shows the most basic understanding of the animal versus plant cell comparison. Note the little green organelles in the Plant cell, chloroplasts.

In his article, KD Suarez draws attention to two plant population studies published in 2014 in which researchers have found neither chloroplasts nor their genomes. 

Although some plants do not have chloroplasts, it has been generally accepted that plants have chloroplast genomes, perhaps because they are similar to the mitochondria in providing energy to the cell.

The first study examined a parasitic flower species native to the Phillipines that gets its food from its plant host, and the researchers did not find the chloroplast genome, according to Suarez.

The second study looked at an algae and found that although it had neither chloroplasts nor its genomes, it did have proteins associated with the chloroplast and its function. 

The Scientist also pointed out the two studies in its article: "Plants Without Plastid Genomes:Two independent teams point to different plants that may have lost their plastid genomes."

Certainly this communicates a long history of parasitism and environmental dependency for these species, assuming that their ancestors had functioning chloroplasts. It may be more material as well as energy efficient for these plants that do not depend on photosynthesis for energy to not have the genome associated with the "useless organelle."

Nonetheless, these studies challenge how scientists classify plants. Perhaps parasites, like genetic mutants, are key to understanding what functions, what does not, and how some organisms have changed over time.