Project description:In contrast to batch cultivation, chemostat cultivation allows the identification of carbon source responses without interference by carbon-catabolite repression, accumulation of toxic products, and differences in specific growth rate. This study focuses on the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, grown in aerobic, carbon-limited chemostat cultures. Genome-wide transcript levels and in vivo fluxes were compared for growth on two sugars, glucose and maltose, and for two C2-compounds, ethanol and acetate. In contrast to previous reports on batch cultures, few genes (180 genes) responded to changes of the carbon source by a changed transcript level. Very few transcript levels were changed when glucose as the growth-limiting nutrient was compared with maltose (33 transcripts), or when acetate was compared with ethanol (16 transcripts). Although metabolic flux analysis using a stoichiometric model revealed major changes in the central carbon metabolism, only 117 genes exhibited a significantly different transcript level when sugars and C2-compounds were provided as the growthlimiting nutrient. Despite the extensive knowledge on carbon source regulation in yeast, many of the carbon source-responsive genes encoded proteins with unknown or incompletely characterized biological functions. In silico promoter analysis of carbon source-responsive genes confirmed the involvement of several known transcriptional regulators and suggested the involvement of additional regulators. Transcripts involved in the glyoxylate cycle and gluconeogenesis showed a good correlation with in vivo fluxes. This correlation was, however, not observed for other important pathways, including the pentose-phosphate pathway, tricarboxylic acid cycle, and, in particular, glycolysis. These results indicate that in vivo fluxes in the central carbon metabolism of S. cerevisiae grown in steadystate, carbon-limited chemostat cultures are controlled to a large extent via post-transcriptional mechanisms. Experiment Overall Design: Cultivation of microorganisms in chemostats offers numerous advantages for studying the structure and regulation of metabolic networks (11). In chemostat cultures, individual culture parameters can be changed, while keeping other relevant physical and chemical culture parameters (composition of synthetic medium, pH, temperature, aeration, etc.) constant. An especially important parameter in this respect is the specific growth rate, which, in a chemostat, is equal to the dilution rate, which can be accurately controlled. This allows the experimenter to investigate the effects of environmental changes or genetic interventions at a fixed specific growth rate, even if these changes result in different specific growth rates in batch cultures. In a chemostat, growth can be limited by a single, selected nutrient. The very low residual concentrations of this growth-limiting nutrient in chemostat cultures alleviate effects of catabolite repression and inactivation. Furthermore, these low residual substrate concentrations prevent substrate toxicity, which, for example, occurs when S. cerevisiae is grown on ethanol or acetate as the carbon source in batch cultures . Experiment Overall Design: The central goal of the present study is to assess to what extent carbon source-dependent regulation of fluxes through central carbon metabolism in S. cerevisiae is regulated at the level of transcription. To this end, we compare the transcriptome of carbon-limited, aerobic chemostat cultures grown on four different carbon sources: glucose, maltose, ethanol, and acetate. Data from the transcriptome analysis are compared with flux distribution profiles calculated with a stoichiometric metabolic network model. Questions that will be addressed are as follows: (i) does glucose-limited aerobic cultivation lead to a complete alleviation of glucose-catabolite repression; (ii) how (in)complete is our understanding of the genes involved in the transcriptional response of S. cerevisiae to four of the most common carbon sources for this yeast; and (iii) to what extent do transcriptome analyses with microarrays provide a reliable indication of flux distribution in metabolic networks?

Project description:Zinc is indispensable for the catalytic activity and structural stability of many proteins, and its deficiency can have severe consequences for microbial growth in natural and industrial environments. For example, Zn depletion in wort negatively affects beer fermentation and quality. Several studies have investigated yeast adaptation to low Zn supply, but were all performed in batch cultures, where specific growth rate depends on Zn availability. The transcriptional responses to growth-rate and Zn availability are then intertwined, which obscures result interpretation. In the present study, transcriptional responses of Saccharomyces cerevisiae to Zn availability were investigated at a fixed specific growth rate under Zn limitation and excess in chemostat culture. To investigate the context-dependency of this transcriptional response, yeast was grown under several chemostat regimes resulting in various carbon (glucose), nitrogen (ammonium) and oxygen supplies. A robust set of genes that responded consistently to Zn limitation was identified and enabled the definition of a Zn-specific Zap1 regulon comprising of 26 genes and characterized by a broader ZRE consensus (MHHAACCBYNMRGGT) than so far described. Most surprising was the Zn-dependent regulation of genes involved in storage carbohydrate metabolism. Their concerted down-regulation was physiologically relevant as revealed by a substantial decrease in glycogen and trehalose cellular content under Zn limitation. An unexpectedly large amount of genes were synergistically or antagonistically regulated by oxygen and Zn availability. This combinatorial regulation suggested a more prominent involvement of Zn in mitochondrial biogenesis and function than hitherto identified Experiment Overall Design: Zinc is indispensable for the catalytic activity and structural stability of many proteins, and its deficiency can have severe consequences for microbial growth in natural and industrial environments. For example, Zn depletion in wort negatively affects beer fermentation and quality. Several studies have investigated yeast adaptation to low Zn supply, but were all performed in batch cultures, where specific growth rate depends on Zn availability. The transcriptional responses to growth-rate and Zn availability are then intertwined, which obscures result interpretation. In the present study, transcriptional responses of Saccharomyces cerevisiae to Zn availability were investigated at a fixed specific growth rate under Zn limitation and excess in chemostat culture. To investigate the context-dependency of this transcriptional response, yeast was grown under several chemostat regimes resulting in various carbon (glucose), nitrogen (ammonium) and oxygen supplies. A robust set of genes that responded consistently to Zn limitation was identified and enabled the definition of a Zn-specific Zap1 regulon comprising of 26 genes and characterized by a broader ZRE consensus (MHHAACCBYNMRGGT) than so far described. Most surprising was the Zn-dependent regulation of genes involved in storage carbohydrate metabolism. Their concerted down-regulation was physiologically relevant as revealed by a substantial decrease in glycogen and trehalose cellular content under Zn limitation. An unexpectedly large amount of genes were synergistically or antagonistically regulated by oxygen and Zn availability. This combinatorial regulation suggested a more prominent involvement of Zn in mitochondrial biogenesis and function than hitherto identified

Project description:Previously, it has been demonstrated that formate can be utilized by Saccharomyces cerevisiae as additional energy source using cells grown in a glucose-limited chemostat. Here, we investigated utilization of formaldehyde as co-substrate. Since endogenous formaldehyde dehydrogenase activities were insufficient to allow co-feeding of formaldehyde, the Hansenula polymorpha FLD1, encoding formaldehyde dehydrogenase, was introduced in S. cerevisiae. Chemostat cultivations revealed that formaldehyde was co-utilized with glucose, but the yield was lower than predicted. Moreover, formate was secreted by the cells. Upon co-expression of the H. polymorpha gene encoding formate dehydrogenase, FMD, the levels of secreted formate decreased, but the biomass yield was still lower than anticipated. Transcriptome comparisons of cells of the engineered FLD1/FMD-expressing S. cerevisiae strain grown with or without formaldehyde feed, suggested that the cells experienced biotin limitation, possibly due to inactivation of biotin by formaldehyde in the feed. When separate feeds were used for formaldehyde and biotin, the engineered S. cerevisiae strain was able to efficiently utilize formaldehyde as additional energy source. Experiment Overall Design: In industrial biotechnology, the cost of feedstocks (often sugars) are crucial for production of both biomass related products, such as proteins, or for the production of commodity chemicals. In many such processes a large fraction of the sugars is dissimilated to either provide free-energy (in the form of ATP) or to provide electrons (in the form of NADH). Co-consumption of methanol, which can be derived from fossil sources (via natural gas) or from biomass (via syngas) , via the above mentioned route can provide NADH and/or ATP, thereby creating the possibility to utilise the sugars more efficiently. It would therefore be advantageous to co-feed S. cerevisiae with methanol during fermentations since it is a cheap alternative to sugars as energy source. Experiment Overall Design: Efficient dissimilation of the intermediate formaldehyde is a crucial first step for utilisation of methanol by S. cerevisiae. Therefore, his study analyses the effect of co-expression of H. polymorpha FLD1 encoding NAD+-dependent formaldehyde and FMD encoding formate dehydrogenases, on tolerance to formaldehyde and co-consumption of formaldehyde by S. cerevisiae.

Project description:Physiological effects of carbon dioxide and impact on genome-wide transcript profiles were analysed in chemostat cultures of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. In anaerobic, glucose-limited chemostat cultures grown at atmospheric pressure, cultivation under CO2-saturated conditions had only a marginal (<10%) impact on the biomass yield. Conversely, a 25% decrease of the biomass yield was found in aerobic, glucose-limited chemostat cultures aerated with a mixture of 79% CO2 and 21% O2. This observation indicated that respiratory metabolism is more sensitive to CO2 than fermentative metabolism. Consistent with the more pronounced physiological effects of CO2 in respiratory cultures, the number of CO2-responsive transcripts was higher in aerobic cultures than in anaerobic cultures. Many genes involved in mitochondrial functions showed a transcriptional response to elevated CO2 concentrations. This is consistent with an uncoupling effect of CO2 and/or intracellular bicarbonate on the mitochondrial inner membrane. Other transcripts that showed a significant transcriptional response to elevated CO2 included NCE103 (probably encoding carbonic anhydrase), PCK1 (encoding PEP carboxykinase) and members of the IMD gene family (encoding isozymes of inosine monophosphate dehydrogenase Experiment Overall Design: Knowledge on the genome-wide transcriptional response of S. cerevisiae to high CO2 concentrations may provide a deeper insight into the molecular mechanisms of CO2 stress. Such insight is essential to develop metabolic-engineering strategies for improving CO2 tolerance. Furthermore, identification of âsignature transcriptsâ that uniquely respond to CO2 stress may be applicable for diagnosing the CO2 status of industrial fermentations. It has recently been demonstrated that the combination of chemostat cultivation with DNA-microarray-based transcriptome analysis offers a powerful and reproducible approach to identify the transcriptional responses of yeasts to environmental parameters For this reason, in the present study we used chemostat cultures of S. cerevisiae to quantify the effect of CO2 on respiring and fermenting cells, and to determine the genome-wide transcriptional responses of this yeast to high CO2 concentrations.

Project description:The irreversible decarboxylation step, which commits 2-oxo acids to the Ehrlich pathway, was initially attributed to pyruvate decarboxylase. However, the yeast genome was shown to harbour no fewer than 5 genes that show sequence similarity with thiamine-diphosphate dependent decarboxylase genes. Three of these (PDC1, PDC5 and PDC6) encode pyruvate decarboxylases { while ARO10 and THI3 represent alternative candidates for Ehrlich-pathway decarboxylases. Transcriptome analysis and decarboxylase activity measurements on an S. cerevisiae aro10 strain, a double aro10 thi3 deletion strain and a quadruple pdc1,5,6,aro10 mutant strains grown in carbonÃ¢â¬âlimited chemostat with phenylalanine as nitrogen source indicated that:; i) PDC5 is strongly upregulated in an aro10 background (Fig. 2) and also encodes a broad-substrate ÃÂ±-keto acid decarboxylase. ii) PDC5 expression depends on the presence of THI3 (Fig. 2), and; iii) in contrast to cell extracts from a strain expressing ARO10 only (pdc1,5,6, thi3), cell extract from a strain that only contains THI3 (pdc1,5,6,aro10) did not produce any ÃÂ±-keto acid decarboxylase activity . THI3 has recently been demonstrated to be involved in regulation of thiamine homeostasis in S. cerevisiae, which further suggests that its role in the Ehrlich pathway may be regulatory rather than catalytic. A systematic investigation of the catalytic properties of all five (putative) TPP-dependent decarboxylases (Aro10p, Thi3p, Pdc1p, Pdc5p, Pdc6p) is essential for a final resolution of the substrate specificity of these key enzymes in the Ehrlich pathway. Experiment Overall Design: Comparison of glucose limited chemostat cultivations with phenylalanine as sole nitrogen sources of the following strains: Experiment Overall Design: - CENPK113-7D MATa MAL2-8c SUC2 Experiment Overall Design: - CENPK555-4A MATa MAL2-8c SUC2 ydr380w delta Experiment Overall Design: - CENPK5632-3B MATalpha MAL2-8c SUC2 ydr380w delta ydl080c delta Experiment Overall Design: - CENPK609-11A MATa MAL2-8c SUC2 pdc1, 5, 6 delta ydr380w delta

Dataset Information

Transcription profiling of S. cerevisiae after prolonged selection in aerobic, glucose-limited chemostat cultures

Publications

Prolonged selection in aerobic, glucose-limited chemostat cultures of Saccharomyces cerevisiae causes a partial loss of glycolytic capacity.

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