Project description:The rise of dark (melanic) forms of many species of moth in heavily coal-polluted areas of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Britain, and their post-1970s fall, point to a common selective pressure (camouflage against bird predators) acting at the community level. The extent to which this convergent phenotypic response relied on similar genetic and developmental mechanisms is unknown. We examine this problem by testing the hypothesis that the locus controlling melanism in Phigalia pilosaria and Odontopera bidentata, two species of geometrid moth that showed strong associations between melanism and coal pollution, is the same as that controlling melanism in Biston betularia, previously identified as the gene cortex. Comparative linkage mapping using family material supports the hypothesis for both species, indicating a deeply conserved developmental mechanism for melanism involving cortex. However, in contrast to the strong selective sweep signature seen in British B. betularia, no significant association was detected between cortex-region markers and melanic morphs in wild-caught samples of P. pilosaria and O. bidentata, implying much older, or diverse, origins of melanic morph alleles in these latter species.
Project description:Our study involves a transcriptomic approach to the analysis of industrial yeast metabolism. Historically, among the hundreds of yeast species, Saccharomyces cerevisiae has played an important role in scientific investigations and industrial applications, and it is universally acknowledged as one of the model systems for eukaryotic organisms. Yeast is also an important component of the wine fermentation process and determines various attributes of the final product. Our research takes a holistic approach to the improvement of industrial yeast strains by integrating large data sets from various yeast strains during fermentation. This means that analysis can be done in such a way as to co-evaluate several parameters simultaneously to identify points of interest and target genes for metabolic engineering. Eventually we hope to construct an accurate information matrix and a more complete cellular map for the fermenting yeast. This will enable accurate model-building for industrial yeast and facilitated the design of intelligent yeast improvement strategies which can be applied via traditional avenues of molecular biology. Experiment Overall Design: Five different Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains used in industrial winemaking processes were used in synthetic must (MS300) fermentations. All fermentations were carried out in triplicate, so each sample is represented by three completely independent biological repeats. Samples for microarray analysis were taken at three different time points during fermentation, representative of the exponential (day2), early stationary (day5) and late stationary (day14) growth stages.
Project description:Our study involves a transcriptomic approach to the analysis of industrial yeast metabolism. Historically, among the hundreds of yeast species, Saccharomyces cerevisiae has played an important role in scientific investigations and industrial applications, and it is universally acknowledged as one of the model systems for eukaryotic organisms. Yeast is also an important component of the wine fermentation process and determines various attributes of the final product. Our research takes a holistic approach to the improvement of industrial yeast strains by integrating large data sets from various yeast strains during fermentation. This means that analysis can be done in such a way as to co-evaluate several parameters simultaneously to identify points of interest and target genes for metabolic engineering. Eventually we hope to construct an accurate information matrix and a more complete cellular map for the fermenting yeast. This will enable accurate model-building for industrial yeast and facilitated the design of intelligent yeast improvement strategies which can be applied via traditional avenues of molecular biology.
Project description:Cell type repertoires have expanded extensively in metazoan animals, with some clade-specific cells being paramount to their evolutionary success. A prime example are the skeletogenic cells of vertebrates that form the basis of their developing endoskeletons. Depending on anatomical location, these cells originate from three different embryonic precursor lineages – the neural crest, the somites, and the lateral plate mesoderm – yet they converge developmentally towards similar cellular phenotypes. Furthermore, these lineages have gained ‘skeletogenic competency’ at distinct timepoints during vertebrate evolution, thus questioning to what extent different parts of the vertebrate skeleton rely on truly homologous cell types. Here, we investigate how lineage-specific molecular properties of the three precursor pools are integrated at the gene regulatory level, to allow for phenotypic convergence towards a skeletogenic cell fate. Using single-cell transcriptomics and chromatin accessibility profiling along the precursor-to-skeletogenic cell continuum, we examine the gene regulatory dynamics associated with this cell fate convergence. We find that distinct transcription factor profiles are inherited from the three precursor states, and that lineage-specific enhancer elements integrate these different inputs at the cis-regulatory level, to execute a core skeletogenic program. We propose a lineage-specific gene regulatory logic for skeletogenic convergence from three embryonic precursor pools. Early skeletal cells in different body parts thus share only a partial ‘deep homology’. This regulatory uncoupling may render them amenable to individualized selection, to help to define distinct morphologies and biomaterial properties in the different parts of the vertebrate skeleton.
Project description:The environmental stresses and inhibitors encounted by Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains are main limiting factors in bioethanol fermentation. Investigation of the molecular mechanisms underlying the stresses-related phenotypes diversities within and between S. cerevisiae populations could guide the construction of yeast strains with improved stresses tolerance and fermentation performances. Here, we explored the genetic characteristics of the bioethanol S. cerevisiae strains, and elucidated the genetic variations correlated with its advantaged traits (higher ethanol yield under sever conditions and better tolerance to multiple stresses compared to an S288c derived laboratory strain BYZ1). Firstly, pulse-field gel electrophoresis combined with array-comparative genomic hybridization was used to compare the genome structure of industrial strains and the laboratory strain BYZ1.
Project description:Cell type repertoires have expanded extensively in metazoan animals, with some clade-specific cells being paramount to their evolutionary success. A prime example are the skeletogenic cells of vertebrates that form the basis of their developing endoskeletons. Depending on anatomical location, these cells originate from three different embryonic precursor lineages – the neural crest, the somites, and the lateral plate mesoderm – yet they converge developmentally towards similar cellular phenotypes. Furthermore, these lineages have gained ‘skeletogenic competency’ at distinct timepoints during vertebrate evolution, thus questioning to what extent different parts of the vertebrate skeleton rely on truly homologous cell types. Here, we investigate how lineage-specific molecular properties of the three precursor pools are integrated at the gene regulatory level, to allow for phenotypic convergence towards a skeletogenic cell fate. Using single-cell transcriptomics and chromatin accessibility profiling along the precursor-to-skeletogenic cell continuum, we examine the gene regulatory dynamics associated with this cell fate convergence. We find that distinct transcription factor profiles are inherited from the three precursor states, and that lineage-specific enhancer elements integrate these different inputs at the cis-regulatory level, to execute a core skeletogenic program. We propose a lineage-specific gene regulatory logic for skeletogenic convergence from three embryonic precursor pools. Early skeletal cells in different body parts thus share only a partial ‘deep homology’. This regulatory uncoupling may render them amenable to individualized selection, to help to define distinct morphologies and biomaterial properties in the different parts of the vertebrate skeleton.