In silico predicted robustness of viroids RNA secondary structures. I. The effect of single mutations

Viroids are plant subviral pathogens whose genomes are constituted by a single-stranded and covalently closed small RNA molecule that does not encode for any protein. Despite this genomic simplicity, they are able of inducing devastating symptoms in susceptible plants. Most of the 29 described viroid species fold into a rodlike or quasi-rodlike structure, whereas a few of them fold as branched structures. The shape of these RNA structures is perhaps one of the most characteristic properties of viroids and sometimes is considered their only phenotype. Here we use RNA thermodynamic secondary structure prediction algorithms to compare the mutational robustness of all viroid species. After characterizing the statistical properties of the distribution of mutational effects on structure stability and the wideness of neutral neighborhood for each viroid species, we show an evolutionary trend toward increased structural robustness during viroid radiation, giving support to the adaptive value of robustness. Differences in robustness among the 2 viroid families can be explained by the larger fragility of branched structures compared with the rodlike ones. We also show that genomic redundancy can contribute to the robustness of these simple RNA genomes.