Maturation of conidia on conidiophores of Aspergillus niger
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ABSTRACT: An Aspergillus niger colony can produce a few billion conidia. Formation of conidia producing conidiophores starts in the centre of the colony and moves outwards ending a few millimetres from the edge of the radial extending mycelium. As a result, the conidia within the colony centre are older than those in the intermediate and sub-peripheral zones. Here, it was assessed whether this results in heterogeneity of conidia within the colony. Conidia were harvested from conidiophores of cultures resulting from a confluent inoculated plate. A total number of 645-2421 genes were differentially expressed (fold change ≥ 2) when expression profiles of 2-, 5-, and 8-day-old conidia freshly harvested from conidiophores were compared. Genes without a PFAM or KEGG annotation were enriched in the up-regulated genes.
Project description:We bulit a pulmonary aspergillosis model in immunocompetent mice. Mice were inoculated intratracheally with 50 μL suspension of conidia , hyphal fragments or normal saline, respectively, after anesthesia. Lungs from were harvested and ground for RNA extraction 24 hours after fungal inoculation. The result of RNA-seq indicated both conidia and hyphae can activate a series of immunologically relevant pathways and these pathways were much more strongly activated by hyphae. Hyphae could promote Th2 cell differentiation and suppress Th1 cell differentiation. Both hyphae and conidia could activate Th17 cell differentiation.
Project description:Conidia of Aspergillus niger are characterized by a dormant state and are moderate stress-resistant. Upon contact with a moist substrate, germination of conidia occurs by changing from a dormant stabilized state towards a growing vegetative cell. The RNA expression levels of dormant conidia and conidia that were in various stages of germination were studied. The RNA composition of dormant conidia was substantially different than all the subsequent stages of germination. This indicates that the distinct morphological changes that occur during germination are not correlated with the highest change in the transcriptome.
Project description:Conidia of Aspergillus niger are characterized by a dormant state and are moderate stress-resistant. Upon contact with a moist substrate, germination of conidia occurs by changing from a dormant stabilized state towards a growing vegetative cell. The RNA expression levels of dormant conidia and conidia that were in various stages of germination were studied. The RNA composition of dormant conidia was substantially different than all the subsequent stages of germination. This indicates that the distinct morphological changes that occur during germination are not correlated with the highest change in the transcriptome. Samples of germinating conidia of Aspergillus niger N402 were taken in triple at 0h (dormant), 2h, 4h, 6h and 8h after inoculation in CM.
Project description:Genome-wide analysis was performed to assess the transcriptional landscape of germinating A. niger conidia using GeneChips. The metabolism of storage compounds during conidial germination was also examined and compared to the transcript levels from associated genes. The transcriptome of dormant conidia was shown to be highly differentiated from that of germinating conidia and major changes in response to environmental shift occurred within the first hour of germination. The breaking of dormancy was associated with increased transcript levels of genes involved in the biosynthesis of proteins, RNA turnover and respiratory metabolism. Increased transcript levels of genes involved in metabolism of nitrate and proline at the onset of germination implies their use as sources of nitrogen. Dormant conidia contained transcripts of genes involved in fermentation, gluconeogenesis and the glyoxylate cycle. The presence of such transcripts in dormant conidia may indicate the generation of energy from non-carbohydrate substrates during starvation-induced conidiation or for maintenance purposes during dormancy. The immediate onset of metabolism of internal storage compounds after the onset of germination, and the presence of transcripts of relevant genes, suggest that conidia are primed for the onset of germination.
Project description:Conidia germination is critical for fungi to colonize various habitats. We sampled RNA expression at four stages of conidia germination, including fresh conidia (15min), polar growth (120min), doubling of long axis (240min), and first hyphal branching (360min) in Neurospora crassa. Cultures were made onPDA, iand two biological replicates were collected for all data points. The growth was under a labratory condition of 25C and constant light.
Project description:Genome-wide analysis was performed to assess the transcriptional landscape of germinating A. niger conidia using GeneChips. The metabolism of storage compounds during conidial germination was also examined and compared to the transcript levels from associated genes. The transcriptome of dormant conidia was shown to be highly differentiated from that of germinating conidia and major changes in response to environmental shift occurred within the first hour of germination. The breaking of dormancy was associated with increased transcript levels of genes involved in the biosynthesis of proteins, RNA turnover and respiratory metabolism. Increased transcript levels of genes involved in metabolism of nitrate and proline at the onset of germination implies their use as sources of nitrogen. Dormant conidia contained transcripts of genes involved in fermentation, gluconeogenesis and the glyoxylate cycle. The presence of such transcripts in dormant conidia may indicate the generation of energy from non-carbohydrate substrates during starvation-induced conidiation or for maintenance purposes during dormancy. The immediate onset of metabolism of internal storage compounds after the onset of germination, and the presence of transcripts of relevant genes, suggest that conidia are primed for the onset of germination. one biological replicate for each sample, each sample contained pooled RNA from three independent replicates
Project description:Conidia germination is critical for fungi to colonize various habitats. We sampled RNA expression at four stages of conidia germination, including fresh conidia (15min), polar growth (120min), doubling of long axis (240min), and first hyphal branching (360min) in Neurospora crassa. Cultures were made on two different media, including Bird medium supporting only asexual development and maple sap medium supporting both asexual and sexual development, and two biological replicates were collected for all data points. The growth was under a labratory condition of 25C and constant light.
Project description:Conidia germination is critical for fungi to colonize various habitats. We sampled RNA expression at four stages of conidia germination, including fresh conidia (15min), polar growth (120min), doubling of long axis (240min), and first hyphal branching (360min) in Neurospora crassa. Cultures were made on Bird medium, and two biological replicates were collected for all data points. The growth was under a labratory condition of 375C and constant light.
Project description:Purpose: The goal of this study is to investigate the responses of HUVECs after the stimulation of conidia of A. fumigatus Methods: HUVECs were stimulated with conidia of Aspergillus fumigatus for 2 and 6 hours. Three biological repeats of stimulated cells or un-stimulated controls were send for RNA sequencing. Results: Using an optimized data analysis workflow, we mapped about 40 million sequence reads per sample to the human genome (build hg38) and identified round 80,000 transcripts in the HUVECs upon stimulation. Conclusions: Our resutls showed the detailed analysis of HUVECs transcriptomes upton conidia of Aspergillus fumigatus stimulation.
Project description:Fungal spores and hyphal fragments are major contributors to the allergic response in the human lung. In this study, using a trypsin-shaving-proteomics approach, we identified the surface-exposed and secreted/shed proteins of Aspergillus fumigatus conidia and investigated the dynamics of the surface proteome under different conditions, including temperature variation and germination. We find that the surface proteome of resting A. fumigatus conidia is quite dynamic, as evidenced by drastically different surface proteomes under different growth conditions. We further investigated two observed A. fumigatus surface proteins, ScwA and CweA; ScwA is specific to the Aspergillus genus and only expressed on conidia grown at higher temperatures, whereas CweA is found throughout the Aspergillus and Penicillium genera. We extended our analysis of the surface proteome of A. fumigatus to other allergy-inducing pathogens; Alternaria alternata, Penicillium rubens, and Cladosporium herbarum, and performed comparative proteomics on resting and swollen conidia, as well as secreted proteins from germinating conidia. In this dataset, we detected 125 protein orthologs in the extracellular region of all four organisms, and 42 nonorthologous proteins produced by A. fumigatus, which may be useful in the development of future diagnostics. This study highlights the dynamic nature of the conidial surface and implicates growth conditions in the antigenicity of fungal conidia.