The second insight is that the most ancestral (least derived),
most bacterium-like and most gene-rich mitochondrial
genome yet described is the 69,034 base pair (bp) mtDNA of
the protist Reclinomonas americana, a jakobid flagellate
[19] (jakobids are a group of putatively early diverging protozoa that share ultrastructural features with certain amitochondrial protists). By comparison, some other protist
mtDNAs, most fungal, and all animal mtDNAs are highly derived, having diverged away from the ancestral pattern exemplified by R. americana mtDNA.