Dataset Information

Evolutionary Diversification of Alanine Transaminases in Yeast: Catabolic Specialization and Biosynthetic Redundancy.

ABSTRACT: Gene duplication is one of the major evolutionary mechanisms providing raw material for the generation of genes with new or modified functions. The yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae originated after an allopolyploidization event, which involved mating between two different ancestral yeast species. ScALT1 and ScALT2 codify proteins with 65% identity, which were proposed to be paralogous alanine transaminases. Further analysis of their physiological role showed that while ScALT1 encodes an alanine transaminase which constitutes the main pathway for alanine biosynthesis and the sole pathway for alanine catabolism, ScAlt2 does not display alanine transaminase activity and is not involved in alanine metabolism. Moreover, phylogenetic studies have suggested that ScALT1 and ScALT2 come from each one of the two parental strains which gave rise to the ancestral hybrid. The present work has been aimed to the understanding of the properties of the ancestral type Lacchancea kluyveri LkALT1 and Kluyveromyces lactis KlALT1, alanine transaminases in order to better understand the ScALT1 and ScALT2 evolutionary history. These ancestral -type species were chosen since they harbor ALT1 genes, which are related to ScALT2. Presented results show that, although LkALT1 and KlALT1 constitute ScALT1 orthologous genes, encoding alanine transaminases, both yeasts display LkAlt1 and KlAlt1 independent alanine transaminase activity and additional unidentified alanine biosynthetic and catabolic pathway(s). Furthermore, phenotypic analysis of null mutants uncovered the fact that KlAlt1 and LkAlt1 have an additional role, not related to alanine metabolism but is necessary to achieve wild type growth rate. Our study shows that the ancestral alanine transaminase function has been retained by the ScALT1 encoded enzyme, which has specialized its catabolic character, while losing the alanine independent role observed in the ancestral type enzymes. The fact that ScAlt2 conserves 64% identity with LkAlt1 and 66% with KlAlt1, suggests that ScAlt2 diversified after the ancestral hybrid was formed. ScALT2 functional diversification resulted in loss of both alanine transaminase activity and the additional alanine-independent LkAlt1 function, since ScALT2 did not complement the Lkalt1? phenotype. It can be concluded that LkALT1 and KlLALT1 functional role as alanine transaminases was delegated to ScALT1, while ScALT2 lost this role during diversification.

SUBMITTER: Escalera-Fanjul X

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5483587 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Evolutionary Diversification of Alanine Transaminases in Yeast: Catabolic Specialization and Biosynthetic Redundancy.

Escalera-Fanjul Ximena X Campero-Basaldua Carlos C Colón Maritrini M González James J Márquez Dariel D González Alicia A

Frontiers in microbiology 20170626

Gene duplication is one of the major evolutionary mechanisms providing raw material for the generation of genes with new or modified functions. The yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae originated after an allopolyploidization event, which involved mating between two different ancestral yeast species. ScALT1 and ScALT2 codify proteins with 65% identity, which were proposed to be paralogous alanine transaminases. Further analysis of their physiological role showed that while ScAL ...[more]

PMID: 28694796

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Project description:Every protein has a biosynthetic cost to the cell based on the synthesis of its constituent amino acids. In order to optimise growth and reproduction, natural selection is expected, where possible, to favour the use of proteins whose constituents are cheaper to produce, as reduced biosynthetic cost may confer a fitness advantage to the organism. Quantifying the cost of amino acid biosynthesis presents challenges, since energetic requirements may change across different cellular and environmental conditions. We developed a systems biology approach to estimate the cost of amino acid synthesis based on genome-scale metabolic models and investigated the effects of the cost of amino acid synthesis on Saccharomyces cerevisiae gene expression and protein evolution. First, we used our two new and six previously reported measures of amino acid cost in conjunction with codon usage bias, tRNA gene number and atomic composition to identify which of these factors best predict transcript and protein levels. Second, we compared amino acid cost with rates of amino acid substitution across four species in the genus Saccharomyces. Regardless of which cost measure is used, amino acid biosynthetic cost is weakly associated with transcript and protein levels. In contrast, we find that biosynthetic cost and amino acid substitution rates show a negative correlation, but for only a subset of cost measures. In the economy of the yeast cell, we find that the cost of amino acid synthesis plays a limited role in shaping transcript and protein expression levels compared to that of translational optimisation. Biosynthetic cost does, however, appear to affect rates of amino acid evolution in Saccharomyces, suggesting that expensive amino acids may only be used when they have specific structural or functional roles in protein sequences. However, as there appears to be no single currency to compute the cost of amino acid synthesis across all cellular and environmental conditions, we conclude that a systems approach is necessary to unravel the full effects of amino acid biosynthetic cost in complex biological systems.

Project description:BackgroundIsoprenoids constitute a vast family of natural compounds performing diverse and essential functions in all domains of life. In most eubacteria, isoprenoids are synthesized through the methylerythritol 4-phosphate (MEP) pathway. The production of MEP is usually catalyzed by deoxyxylulose 5-phosphate reductoisomerase (DXR-I) but a few organisms use an alternative DXR-like enzyme (DXR-II).ResultsSearches through 1498 bacterial complete proteomes detected 130 sequences with similarity to DXR-II. Phylogenetic analysis identified three well-resolved clades: the DXR-II family (clustering 53 sequences including eleven experimentally verified as functional enzymes able to produce MEP), and two previously uncharacterized NAD(P)-dependent oxidoreductase families (designated DLO1 and DLO2 for DXR-II-like oxidoreductases 1 and 2). Our analyses identified amino acid changes critical for the acquisition of DXR-II biochemical function through type-I functional divergence, two of them mapping onto key residues for DXR-II activity. DXR-II showed a markedly discontinuous distribution, which was verified at several levels: taxonomic (being predominantly found in Alphaproteobacteria and Firmicutes), metabolic (being mostly found in bacteria with complete functional MEP pathways with or without DXR-I), and phenotypic (as no biological/phenotypic property was found to be preferentially distributed among DXR-II-containing strains, apart from pathogenicity in animals). By performing a thorough comparative sequence analysis of GC content, 3:1 dinucleotide frequencies, codon usage and codon adaptation indexes (CAI) between DXR-II sequences and their corresponding genomes, we examined the role of horizontal gene transfer (HGT), as opposed to an scenario of massive gene loss, in the evolutionary origin and diversification of the DXR-II subfamily in bacteria.ConclusionsOur analyses support a single origin of the DXR-II family through functional divergence, in which constitutes an exceptional model of acquisition and maintenance of redundant gene functions between non-homologous genes as a result of convergent evolution. Subsequently, although old episodic events of HGT could not be excluded, the results supported a prevalent role of gene loss in explaining the distribution of DXR-II in specific pathogenic eubacteria. Our results highlight the importance of the functional characterization of evolutionary shortcuts in isoprenoid biosynthesis for screening specific antibacterial drugs and for regulating the production of isoprenoids of human interest.

Dataset Information

Evolutionary Diversification of Alanine Transaminases in Yeast: Catabolic Specialization and Biosynthetic Redundancy.

Publications

Evolutionary Diversification of Alanine Transaminases in Yeast: Catabolic Specialization and Biosynthetic Redundancy.

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