Comparative live-cell imaging analyses of SPA-2, BUD-6 and BNI-1 in Neurospora crassa reveal novel features of the filamentous fungal polarisome

Alexander Lichius (2012, [Artículo])

A key multiprotein complex involved in regulating the actin cytoskeleton and secretory machinery required for polarized growth in fungi, is the polarisome. Recognized core constituents in budding yeast are the proteins Spa2, Pea2, Aip3/Bud6, and the key effector Bni1. Multicellular fungi display a more complex polarized morphogenesis than yeasts, suggesting that the filamentous fungal polarisome might fulfill additional functions. In this study, we compared the subcellular organization and dynamics of the putative polarisome components BUD-6 and BNI-1 with those of the bona fide polarisome marker SPA-2 at various developmental stages of Neurospora crassa. All three proteins exhibited a yeast-like polarisome configuration during polarized germ tube growth, cell fusion, septal pore plugging and tip repolarization. However, the localization patterns of all three proteins showed spatiotemporally distinct characteristics during the establishment of new polar axes, septum formation and cytokinesis, and maintained hyphal tip growth. Most notably, in vegetative hyphal tips BUD-6 accumulated as a subapical cloud excluded from the Spitzenkörper (Spk), whereas BNI-1 and SPA-2 partially colocalized with the Spk and the tip apex. Novel roles during septal plugging and cytokinesis, connected to the reinitiation of tip growth upon physical injury and conidial maturation, were identified for BUD-6 and BNI-1, respectively. Phenotypic analyses of gene deletion mutants revealed additional functions for BUD-6 and BNI-1 in cell fusion regulation, and the maintenance of Spk integrity. Considered together, our findings reveal novel polarisome-independent functions of BUD-6 and BNI-1 in Neurospora, but also suggest that all three proteins cooperate at plugged septal pores, and their complex arrangement within the apical dome of mature hypha might represent a novel aspect of filamentous fungal polarisome architecture. © 2012 Lichius et al.

fungal protein, protein BNI 1, protein BUD 6, protein SPA 2, protein Spk, unclassified drug, actin binding protein, cytoskeleton protein, fungal protein, article, cell fusion, cellular distribution, comparative study, conidium, controlled study, cyto BIOLOGÍA Y QUÍMICA CIENCIAS DE LA VIDA MICROBIOLOGÍA MICROBIOLOGÍA

The banana MaWRKY18, MaWRKY45, MaWRKY60 and MaWRKY70 genes encode functional transcription factors and display differential expression in response to defense phytohormones

SERGIO GARCIA LAYNES VIRGINIA AURORA HERRERA VALENCIA Lilia Guadalupe Tamayo Torres VERONICA LIMONES BRIONES FELIPE ALONSO BARREDO POOL FRAY MARTIN BAAS ESPINOLA Angel Alpuche-Solis CARLOS ALBERTO PUCH HAU SANTY PERAZA ECHEVERRIA (2022, [Artículo])

WRKY transcription factors (TFs) play key roles in plant defense responses through phytohormone signaling pathways. However, their functions in tropical fruit crops, especially in banana, remain largely unknown. Several WRKY genes from the model plants rice (OsWRKY45) and Arabidopsis (AtWRKY18, AtWRKY60, AtWRKY70) have shown to be attractive TFs for engineering disease resistance. In this study, we isolated four banana cDNAs (MaWRKY18, MaWRKY45, MaWRKY60, and MaWRKY70) with homology to these rice and Arabidopsis WRKY genes. The MaWRKY cDNAs were isolated from the wild banana Musa acuminata ssp. malaccensis, which is resistant to several diseases of this crop and is a progenitor of most banana cultivars. The deduced amino acid sequences of the four MaWRKY cDNAs revealed the presence of the conserved WRKY domain of ~60 amino acids and a zinc-finger motif at the N-terminus. Based on the number of WRKY repeats and the structure of the zinc-finger motif, MaWRKY18 and MaWRKY60 belong to group II of WRKY TFs, while MaWRKY45 and MaWRKY70 are members of group III. Their corresponding proteins were located in the nuclei of onion epidermal cells and were shown to be functional TFs in yeast cells. Moreover, expression analyses revealed that the majority of these MaWRKY genes were upregulated by salicylic acid (SA) or methyl jasmonate (MeJA) phytohormones, although the expression levels were relatively higher with MeJA treatment. The fact that most of these banana WRKY genes were upregulated by SA or MeJA, which are involved in systemic acquired resistance (SAR) or induced systemic resistance (ISR), respectively, make them interesting candidates for bioengineering broad-spectrum resistance in this crop. © 2022 by the authors.

BANANA TRANSCRIPTION FACTOR WRKY DEFENSE PHYTOHORMONES SALICYLIC ACID METHYL JASMONATE SAR ISR BROAD-SPECTRUM RESISTANCE BIOLOGÍA Y QUÍMICA CIENCIAS DE LA VIDA GENÉTICA GENÉTICA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS GENÉTICA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS

Potential of Omics to control diseases and pests in the Coconut tree

MIGUEL ALONSO TZEC SIMA Jean Wildort Félix María Inés Granados Alegría Mónica Aparicio Ortiz Dilery Juarez Monroy Damian Mayo Sarai Vivas-Lopez Rufino Gómez-Tah Blondy Beatriz Canto Canché Maxim Berezovski Ignacio Rodrigo Islas Flores (2022, [Artículo])

The coconut palm (Cocos nucifera L.) is a common crop in pantropical areas facing various challenges, one of them being the control of diseases and pests. Diseases such as bud rot caused by Phytophthora palmivora, lethal yellowing caused by phytoplasmas of the types 16SrIV-A, 16SrIV-D or 16SrIV-E, among others, and pests like the coconut palm weevil, Rhynchophorus vulneratus (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), and the horned beetle, Oryctes rhinocerus (Coleoptera: Scarabaeidae), are controlled by applying pesticides, pheromones and cultural control. These practices do not guarantee eradication since some causal agents have become resistant or are imbedded in infected tissues making them difficult to eradicate. This review condenses the current genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics studies which are being conducted with the aim of understanding the pathosystems associated with the coconut palm, highlighting the findings generated by omics studies that may become future targets for the control of diseases and pests in the coconut crop. © 2022 by the authors.

COCOS NUCIFERA L. OMICS PESTS INSECTS DISEASES PATHOGENS BIOLOGÍA Y QUÍMICA CIENCIAS DE LA VIDA BIOLOGÍA MOLECULAR BIOLOGÍA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS BIOLOGÍA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS

Análisis de la expresión de genes involucrados en la conversión en planta de embriones somáticos de Capsicum chinense Jacq.

Gema Pijeira Fernández (2020, [Tesis de maestría])

BIOLOGÍA Y QUÍMICA CIENCIAS DE LA VIDA BIOLOGÍA MOLECULAR BIOLOGÍA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS BIOLOGÍA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS

Molecular modeling simulation studies reveal new potential inhibitors against HPV E6 protein

Joel Ricci-Lopez (2019, [Artículo])

High-risk strains of human papillomavirus (HPV) have been identified as the etiologic agent of some anogenital tract, head, and neck cancers. Although prophylactic HPV vaccines have been approved; it is still necessary a drug-based treatment against the infection and its oncogenic effects. The E6 oncoprotein is one of the most studied therapeutic targets of HPV, it has been identified as a key factor in cell immortalization and tumor progression in HPV-positive cells. E6 can promote the degradation of p53, a tumor suppressor protein, through the interaction with the cellular ubiquitin ligase E6AP. Therefore, preventing the formation of the E6-E6AP complex is one of the main strategies to inhibit the viability and proliferation of infected cells. Herein, we propose an in silico pipeline to identify small-molecule inhibitors of the E6-E6AP interaction. Virtual screening was carried out by predicting the ADME properties of the molecules and performing ensemble-based docking simulations to E6 protein followed by binding free energy estimation through MM/PB(GB)SA methods. Finally, the top-three compounds were selected, and their stability in the E6 docked complex and their effect in the inhibition of the E6-E6AP interaction was corroborated by molecular dynamics simulation. Therefore, this pipeline and the identified molecules represent a new starting point in the development of anti-HPV drugs. © 2019 Ricci-López et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

ligand, luteolin, protein E6, protein inhibitor, ubiquitin protein ligase, ubiquitin protein ligase E6AP, unclassified drug, antivirus agent, DNA binding protein, E6 protein, Human papillomavirus type 18, oncoprotein, protein binding, protein p53, TP CIENCIAS AGROPECUARIAS Y BIOTECNOLOGÍA CIENCIAS AGROPECUARIAS Y BIOTECNOLOGÍA

Functional characterization and cellular dynamics of the CDC-42 - RAC - CDC-24 module in neurospora crassa

CYNTHIA LIZZETH ARAUJO PALOMARES (2011, [Artículo])

Rho-type GTPases are key regulators that control eukaryotic cell polarity, but their role in fungal morphogenesis is only beginning to emerge. In this study, we investigate the role of the CDC-42 - RAC - CDC-24 module in Neurospora crassa. rac and cdc-42 deletion mutants are viable, but generate highly compact colonies with severe morphological defects. Double mutants carrying conditional and loss of function alleles of rac and cdc-42 are lethal, indicating that both GTPases share at least one common essential function. The defects of the GTPase mutants are phenocopied by deletion and conditional alleles of the guanine exchange factor (GEF) cdc-24, and in vitro GDP-GTP exchange assays identify CDC-24 as specific GEF for both CDC-42 and RAC. In vivo confocal microscopy shows that this module is organized as membrane-associated cap that covers the hyphal apex. However, the specific localization patterns of the three proteins are distinct, indicating different functions of RAC and CDC-42 within the hyphal tip. CDC-42 localized as confined apical membrane-associated crescent, while RAC labeled a membrane-associated ring excluding the region labeled by CDC42. The GEF CDC-24 occupied a strategic position, localizing as broad apical membrane-associated crescent and in the apical cytosol excluding the Spitzenkörper. RAC and CDC-42 also display distinct localization patterns during branch initiation and germ tube formation, with CDC-42 accumulating at the plasma membrane before RAC. Together with the distinct cellular defects of rac and cdc-42 mutants, these localizations suggest that CDC-42 is more important for polarity establishment, while the primary function of RAC may be maintaining polarity. In summary, this study identifies CDC-24 as essential regulator for RAC and CDC-42 that have common and distinct functions during polarity establishment and maintenance of cell polarity in N. crassa. © 2011 Araujo-Palomares et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

CDC24 protein, guanine nucleotide exchange factor, protein Cdc42, Rac protein, unclassified drug, cell cycle protein, fungal protein, membrane protein, multiprotein complex, protein Cdc42, Rac protein, allele, apical membrane, article, assay, cell me BIOLOGÍA Y QUÍMICA CIENCIAS DE LA VIDA MICROBIOLOGÍA MICROBIOLOGÍA

A simple extension to the CMASA method for the prediction of catalytic residues in the presence of single point mutations

David Israel Flores Granados (2014, [Artículo])

The automatic identification of catalytic residues still remains an important challenge in structural bioinformatics. Sequence-based methods are good alternatives when the query shares a high percentage of identity with a well-annotated enzyme. However, when the homology is not apparent, which occurs with many structures from the structural genome initiative, structural information should be exploited. A local structural comparison is preferred to a global structural comparison when predicting functional residues. CMASA is a recently proposed method for predicting catalytic residues based on a local structure comparison. The method achieves high accuracy and a high value for the Matthews correlation coefficient. However, point substitutions or a lack of relevant data strongly affect the performance of the method. In the present study, we propose a simple extension to the CMASA method to overcome this difficulty. Extensive computational experiments are shown as proof of concept instances, as well as for a few real cases. The results show that the extension performs well when the catalytic site contains mutated residues or when some residues are missing. The proposed modification could correctly predict the catalytic residues of a mutant thymidylate synthase, 1EVF. It also successfully predicted the catalytic residues for 3HRC despite the lack of information for a relevant side chain atom in the PDB file. © 2014 Flores et al.

1UU9 protein, 3HRC protein, protein, thymidylate synthase, unclassified drug, protein kinase, thymidylate synthase, accuracy, algorithm, Article, CMASA, CMASA Substitution Matrix, Contact Matrix Average Deviation, controlled study, correlation coeffi CIENCIAS FÍSICO MATEMÁTICAS Y CIENCIAS DE LA TIERRA MATEMÁTICAS ANÁLISIS NUMÉRICO ANÁLISIS NUMÉRICO

Predicción de actividad antimicrobiana usando modelos de escala evolutiva a través de un flujo de trabajo en la plataforma KNIME

Prediction of antimicrobial activity using models of evolutionary scale through a workflow in the KNIME platform

Karla Lorena MartÍnez Mauricio (2023, [Tesis de maestría])

Dentro de las estrategias para combatir la resistencia antimicrobiana, se está llevando a cabo investigación para la creación de nuevos fármacos basados en péptidos antimicrobianos. En los últimos años, se han realizado esfuerzos para incorporar herramientas computacionales que ayuden a acelerar la identificación de péptidos con actividad antimicrobiana. Una de estas herramientas son los modelos QSAR basados en aprendizaje tradicional, que permiten predecir la actividad antimicrobiana en péptidos a partir de información basada en su secuencia. Un componente clave en este proceso es el tipo de características moleculares a utilizar. Recientemente, ha surgido una familia de modelos pre-entrenados llamados ESM-2, los cuales generan incrustaciones (características) que fueron aprendidas a partir de 65 millones de secuencias que abarcan diversidad evolutiva. En este trabajo de tesis, se analiza la contribución de las incrustaciones ESM-2 de diferentes dimensiones de forma individual y en conjunto en el desarrollo de modelos QSAR basados en aprendizaje tradicional para la clasificación de péptidos antimicrobianos, así como sus tipos funcionales, como antibacteriano, antifúngico y antiviral. A partir de este estudio se concluye que aumentar la capacidad de los modelos ESM-2 no implica una mejora en el rendimiento de los modelos para predecir péptidos antimicrobianos. Los modelos ESM-2 t30 y ESM-2 t33 son los más apropiados para extraer características y mejorar la exactitud en las predicciones de péptidos antimicrobianos. Además, fusionar características de diferentes incrustaciones ESM-2 es una estrategia efectiva para construir mejores modelos QSAR que el uso exclusivo de características derivadas de un modelo ESM-2 específico. Se construyeron modelos más simples con un rendimiento comparable o superior a los modelos basados en aprendizaje profundo reportados en la literatura. Para llevar a cabo este estudio se implementó un flujo de trabajo en KNIME que genera de forma automática hasta 1980 modelos de clasificación binaria basados en aprendizaje tradicional. Incorpora diversas técnicas de selección de características, algoritmos de clasificación, métricas de desempeño y una fase de limpieza de datos. Este flujo de trabajo se encuentra disponible en https://github.com/cicese-biocom/classification-QSAR-bioKom.

Molecular features play an important role in different bio-chem-informatics tasks, such as the Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationships (QSAR) modeling. Several pre-trained models have been recently created to be used in downstream tasks either by fine-tuning a specific model or by extracting features to feed traditional classifiers. In this sense, a new family of Evolutionary Scale Modeling models (termed as ESM-2 models) has been recently introduced, demonstrating outstanding results in structure protein prediction benchmarks. Herein, we are devoted to assessing the usefulness of different-dimensional embeddings derived from ESM-2 models in the prediction of antimicrobial peptides, given the great deal of attention received because of their potential to become a plausible option to mainly fight multi-drug resistant bacteria. To this end, we created a KNIME workflow to guarantee using the same modeling methodology, and consequently, carrying out fair comparisons. As a result, it can be drawn that the 640- and 1,280- dimensional embeddings are the most appropriate to be used in modeling because statistically better results were achieved from them. We also combined features from different embeddings, and we can draw that the fusion of features of different embeddings contributes to getting better models than only using a specific model ESM-2. Comparisons regarding state-of-the-art deep learning models confirm that when performing methodologically principled studies in the prediction of AMPs, non-DL based models yield comparable-to-superior results to DL-based models. The implemented KNIME workflow is availablefreely at https://github.com/cicese-biocom/classification-QSAR-bioKom. We consider that this workflow can be valuable to prevent unfair comparisons regarding new computational methods, as well as to propose new non-DL based models.

péptidos antimicrobianos, QSAR, aprendizaje automático ESM-2, KNIME antimicrobial peptides, QSAR, machine learning, ESM-2, KNIME INGENIERÍA Y TECNOLOGÍA CIENCIAS TECNOLÓGICAS TECNOLOGÍA DE LOS ORDENADORES DISEÑO CON AYUDA DE ORDENADOR DISEÑO CON AYUDA DE ORDENADOR

Exploring the genetic diversity and population structure of wheat landrace population conserved at ICARDA genebank

Muhammad Massub Tehseen Fatma Aykut Tonk Ahmed Amri Carolina Sansaloni Ezgi Kurtulus Muhammad Salman Mubarik Kumarse Nazari (2022, [Artículo])

Wheat Landraces Genetic Diversity SNP Markers Analysis of Molecular Variance AMOVA CIENCIAS AGROPECUARIAS Y BIOTECNOLOGÍA BREEDING DISCRIMINANT ANALYSIS GENETIC VARIATION GENETIC DISTANCE GENETIC IMPROVEMENT GENETIC MARKERS HEXAPLOIDY LANDRACES POPULATION STRUCTURE SINGLE NUCLEOTIDE POLYMORPHISM TRITICUM AESTIVUM WHEAT

Solanum tuberosum Microtuber Development under Darkness Unveiled through RNAseq Transcriptomic Analysis

ELIANA VALENCIA LOZANO LISSET HERRERA ISIDRON Osiel Salvador Recoder-Meléndez Aarón Barraza Celis JOSE LUIS CABRERA PONCE (2022, [Artículo])

"Potato microtuber (MT) development through in vitro techniques are ideal propagules for producing high quality potato plants. MT formation is influenced by several factors, i.e., photoperiod, sucrose, hormones, and osmotic stress. We have previously developed a protocol of MT induction in medium with sucrose (8% w/v), gelrite (6g/L), and 2iP as cytokinin under darkness. To understand the molecular mechanisms involved, we performed a transcriptome-wide analysis. Here we show that 1715 up- and 1624 down-regulated genes were involved in this biological process. Through the protein–protein interaction (PPI) network analyses performed in the STRING database (v11.5), we found 299 genes tightly associated in 14 clusters. Two major clusters of up-regulated proteins fundamental for life growth and development were found: 29 ribosomal proteins (RPs) interacting with 6 PEBP family members and 117 cell cycle (CC) proteins. The PPI network of up-regulated transcription factors (TFs) revealed that at least six TFs–MYB43, TSF, bZIP27, bZIP43, HAT4 and WOX9–may be involved during MTs development. The PPI network of down-regulated genes revealed a cluster of 83 proteins involved in light and photosynthesis, 110 in response to hormone, 74 in hormone mediate signaling pathway and 22 related to aging."

transcriptome-wide analysis, microtubers, potato, Solanum tuberosum, darkness, cell cycle, ribosomal proteins, PEBP family genes, cytokinin BIOLOGÍA Y QUÍMICA CIENCIAS DE LA VIDA GENÉTICA GENÉTICA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS GENÉTICA MOLECULAR DE PLANTAS