Rhodelphis

Rhodelphis is a single-celled archaeplastid that lives in aquatic environments and is the sister group to red algae and possibly Picozoa. While red algae have no flagellated stages and are generally photoautotrophic, Rhodelphis is a flagellated predator containing a non-photosynthetic plastid. This group is important to the understanding of plastid evolution because they provide insight into the morphology and biochemistry of early archaeplastids. Rhodelphis contains a remnant plastid that is not capable of photosynthesis, but may play a role in biochemical pathways in the cell like heme synthesis and iron-sulfur clustering. The plastid does not have a genome, but genes are targeted to it from the nucleus. Rhodelphis is ovoid with a tapered anterior end bearing two perpendicularly-oriented flagella.

== Taxonomy == === History and location === Rhodelphis was described in 2019 by Ryan M. R. Gawryluk and coauthors, through a paper published in Nature. The genus was created for two different cultures of protists isolated in previous years. Rhodelphis marinus was first collected in 2015 from marine coral sand in Island Bay Canh, Con Dao, Vietnam. Rhodelphis limneticus was first collected in 2016 from a freshwater lake in Chernigovskaya oblast, Ukraine. A third species was described in 2023, Rhodelphis mylnikovi, isolated from a freshwater pond near Montigny-le-Bretonneux, France. left|thumb|266x266px|Cellular anatomy and behaviors of Rhodelphis mylnikovi.