Structural insights into the Smirnoff-Wheeler pathway for vitamin C production in the Amazon fruit camu-camu.

l-Ascorbic acid (AsA, vitamin C) is a pivotal dietary nutrient with multifaceted importance in living organisms. In plants, the Smirnoff-Wheeler pathway is the primary route for AsA biosynthesis, and understanding the mechanistic details behind its component enzymes has implications for plant biology, nutritional science, and biotechnology. As part of an initiative to determine the structures of all six core enzymes of the pathway, the present study focuses on three of them in the model species Myrciaria dubia (camu-camu): GDP-d-mannose 3',5'-epimerase (GME), l-galactose dehydrogenase (l-GalDH), and l-galactono-1,4-lactone dehydrogenase (l-GalLDH). We provide insights into substrate and cofactor binding and the conformational changes they induce. The MdGME structure reveals a distorted substrate in the active site, pertinent to the catalytic mechanism. Mdl-GalDH shows that the way in which NAD+ association affects loop structure over the active site is not conserved when compared with its homologue in spinach. Finally, the structure of Mdl-GalLDH is described for the first time. This allows for the rationalization of previously identified residues which play important roles in the active site or in the formation of the covalent bond with FAD. In conclusion, this study enhances our understanding of AsA biosynthesis in plants, and the information provided should prove useful for biotechnological applications.

Engineering the catalytic activity of an Antarctic PET-degrading enzyme by loop exchange.

Several hydrolases have been described to degrade polyethylene terephthalate (PET) at moderate temperatures ranging from 25°C to 40°C. These mesophilic PET hydrolases (PETases) are less efficient in degrading this plastic polymer than their thermophilic homologs and have, therefore, been the subject of many protein engineering campaigns. However, enhancing their enzymatic activity through rational design or directed evolution poses a formidable challenge due to the need for exploring a large number of mutations. Additionally, evaluating the improvements in both activity and stability requires screening numerous variants, either individually or using high-throughput screening methods. Here, we utilize instead the design of chimeras as a protein engineering strategy to increase the activity and stability of Mors1, an Antarctic PETase active at 25°C. First, we obtained the crystal structure of Mors1 at 1.6 Å resolution, which we used as a scaffold for structure- and sequence-based chimeric design. Then, we designed a Mors1 chimera via loop exchange of a highly divergent active site loop from the thermophilic leaf-branch compost cutinase (LCC) into the equivalent region in Mors1. After restitution of an active site disulfide bond into this chimera, the enzyme exhibited a shift in optimal temperature for activity to 45°C and an increase in fivefold in PET hydrolysis when compared with wild-type Mors1 at 25°C. Our results serve as a proof of concept of the utility of chimeric design to further improve the activity and stability of PETases active at moderate temperatures.

Analysis and functional annotation of an expressed sequence tag collection for tropical crop sugarcane.

To contribute to our understanding of the genome complexity of sugarcane, we undertook a large-scale expressed sequence tag (EST) program. More than 260,000 cDNA clones were partially sequenced from 26 standard cDNA libraries generated from different sugarcane tissues. After the processing of the sequences, 237,954 high-quality ESTs were identified. These ESTs were assembled into 43,141 putative transcripts. Of the assembled sequences, 35.6% presented no matches with existing sequences in public databases. A global analysis of the whole SUCEST data set indicated that 14,409 assembled sequences (33% of the total) contained at least one cDNA clone with a full-length insert. Annotation of the 43,141 assembled sequences associated almost 50% of the putative identified sugarcane genes with protein metabolism, cellular communication/signal transduction, bioenergetics, and stress responses. Inspection of the translated assembled sequences for conserved protein domains revealed 40,821 amino acid sequences with 1415 Pfam domains. Reassembling the consensus sequences of the 43,141 transcripts revealed a 22% redundancy in the first assembling. This indicated that possibly 33,620 unique genes had been identified and indicated that >90% of the sugarcane expressed genes were tagged.

Identification of sugarcane genes involved in the purine synthesis pathway

A via de síntese de purino nucleotídeos é considerada uma via de central importância para todas as células. Na maioria dos organismos, os purino nucleotídeos säo sintetizados "de novo" a partir de precursores näo-nucleotídicos como amino ácidos, amônia e dióxido de carbono. O conhecimento das enzimas envolvidas na via de síntese de purinas da cana-de-açúcar vai abrir a possibilidade do uso dessas enzimas como alvos no desenho racional de inibidores no combate a agentes fitopatogênicos, como esta sendo feita com diversos parasitos e células cancerosas. A seguinte estratégia está sendo utilizada na identificaçäo de genes de cana-de-açúcar para cada membro da via de síntese de purinas: Seqüências representativas dos genes que compõe a via foram escolhidas do banco de dados NCBI. Essas seqüências de peptídeos estäo sendo utilizadas em buscas ao banco de dados gerado pelo SUCEST pelo programa BLAST (implementaçäo tBLASTn). Alinhamentos com os clusters de cana-de-açúcar säo posteriormente analisados para sua significância estatística pela implementaçäo PRSS3 do algoritmo conhecido como Monte Carlo shuffling. Para calibrar a análise dos resultados de PRSS3, foram empregadas seqüências conhecidas de diferentes taxas ao longo da árvore filogenética. Essas seqüências säo comparadas duas a duas e com o cluster da cana-de-açúcar. A tabela de valores-p resultante indica o grau estatístico de similaridade e divergência entre as seqüências já descritas e entre essas e os clusters de cana-de-açúcar. Os resultados obtidos dessas análises estäo descritos neste artigo.