Dataset Information

Triacylglyceride production and autophagous responses in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii depend on resource allocation and carbon source.

ABSTRACT: To improve the economic viability of microalgal biodiesel, it will be essential to optimize the productivity of fuel molecules such as triacylglyceride (TAG) within the microalgal cell. To understand some of the triggers required for the metabolic switch to TAG production, we studied the effect of the carbon supply (acetate or CO?) in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (wild type and the starchless sta6 mutant) grown under low N availability. As expected, initial rates of TAG production were much higher when acetate was present than under strictly photosynthetic conditions, particularly for the sta6 mutant, which cannot allocate resources to starch. However, in both strains, TAG production plateaued after a few days in mixotrophic cultures, whereas under autotrophic conditions, TAG levels continued to rise. Moreover, the reduced growth of the sta6 mutant meant that the greatest productivity (measured as mg TAG liter?¹ day?¹) was found in the wild type growing autotrophically. Wild-type cells responded to low N by autophagy, as shown by degradation of polar (membrane) lipids and loss of photosynthetic pigments, and this was less in cells supplied with acetate. In contrast, little or no autophagy was observed in sta6 mutant cells, regardless of the carbon supply. Instead, very high levels of free fatty acids were observed in the sta6 mutant, suggesting considerable alteration in metabolism. These measurements show the importance of carbon supply and strain selection for lipid productivity. Our findings will be of use for industrial cultivation, where it will be preferable to use fast-growing wild-type strains supplied with gaseous CO? under autotrophic conditions rather than require an exogenous supply of organic carbon.

SUBMITTER: Davey MP

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3957581 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

Triacylglyceride production and autophagous responses in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii depend on resource allocation and carbon source.

Davey Matthew P MP Horst Irmtraud I Duong Giang-Huong GH Tomsett Eleanor V EV Litvinenko Alexander C P AC Howe Christopher J CJ Smith Alison G AG

Eukaryotic cell 20140110 3

To improve the economic viability of microalgal biodiesel, it will be essential to optimize the productivity of fuel molecules such as triacylglyceride (TAG) within the microalgal cell. To understand some of the triggers required for the metabolic switch to TAG production, we studied the effect of the carbon supply (acetate or CO₂) in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (wild type and the starchless sta6 mutant) grown under low N availability. As expected, initial rates of TAG production were much higher ...[more]

PMID: 24413660

Similar Datasets

Project description:When the sta6 (starch-null) strain of the green microalga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii is nitrogen-starved in acetate and then "boosted" after two days with additional acetate, the cells become "obese" after eight days, with triacylglyceride-filled lipid bodies filling their cytoplasm and chloroplasts. To assess the transcriptional correlates of this response, sta6 and the starch-forming cw15 strain were subjected to RNA-Seq analysis during the two days prior and two days post boost, and the data were compared with published reports using other strains and growth conditions. During the two hours post boost, ~425 genes are up-regulated M-bM-^IM-%2-fold and ~875 genes are down-regulated M-bM-^IM-%2-fold in each strain. Expression of a small subset of "sensitive" genes, encoding enzymes in the glyoxylate and Calvin Benson cycles, gluconeogenesis, and the pentose phosphate pathway, is responsive to culture conditions and genetic background as well as to boost. Four genes--encoding a diacylglycerol acyltransferase (DGTT2), a glycerol-3-P dehydrogenase (GPD3), and two candidate lipases (Cre03.g155250 and Cre17.g735600)--are selectively up-regulated in sta6. Although the bulk rate of acetate depletion from the medium is not boost-enhanced, three candidate acetate permease-encoding genes in the GPR1_FUN34_YaaH superfamily are boost-up-regulated, and 13 of the "sensitive" genes are strongly responsive to the cell's acetate status. A cohort of 64 autophagy-related genes is down-regulated by boost. Our results indicate that the boost serves both to avert an autophagy program and to prolong the operation of key pathways that shuttle carbon from acetate into storage lipid, the combined outcome being enhanced TAG accumulation, notably in sta6. Here we report studies on gene-expression patterns during the path to obesity. The Merchant/Pellegrini and Los Alamos laboratories recently generated and analyzed RNA-Seq transcriptomes of cw15, sta6, and several complemented sta6 strains during two days of N-starvation (0M-bM-^FM-^R48 h). In collaboration with these groups, the Goodenough lab generated a second pair of transcriptomes using cw15 and sta6, tracing 0M-bM-^FM-^R48 h gene expression patterns under a different set of culture conditions and taking the time course out to 96 h, with an intervening acetate boost. Analysis of these data was deeply informed by cross-comparisons with the Blaby et al. data. Three additional RNA-Seq studies of wild-type strains were also considered.

Dataset Information

Triacylglyceride production and autophagous responses in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii depend on resource allocation and carbon source.

Publications

Triacylglyceride production and autophagous responses in Chlamydomonas reinhardtii depend on resource allocation and carbon source.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets