Project description:Plants and rhizosphere microbes rely closely on each other, with plants supplying carbon to bacteria in root exudates, and bacteria mobilizing soil-bound phosphate for plant nutrition. When the phosphate supply becomes limiting for plant growth, the composition of root exudation changes, affecting rhizosphere microbial communities and microbially-mediated nutrient fluxes. To evaluate how plant phosphate deprivation affects rhizosphere bacteria, Lolium perenne seedlings were root-inoculated with Pseudomonas aeruginosa 7NR, and grown in axenic microcosms under different phosphate regimes (330 uM vs 3-6 uM phosphate). The effect of biological nutrient limitation was examined by DNA microarray studies of rhizobacterial gene expression.
Project description:Dictyostelium discoideum amoebae feed by ingesting bacteria, then killing them in phagosomes. Ingestion and killing of different bacteria have been shown to rely on largely different molecular mechanisms. One would thus expect that D. discoideum adapts its ingestion and killing machinery when encountering different bacteria. In this study, we investigated by RNA sequencing if and how D. discoideum amoebae respond to the presence of different bacteria by modifying their gene expression patterns. Each bacterial species analyzed induced a specific modification of the transcriptome. Bacteria such as Bacillus subtilis, Klebsiella pneumoniae, or Mycobacterium marinum induced a specific and different transcriptional response, while Micrococcus luteus did not trigger a significant gene regulation. Although folate has been proposed to be one of the key molecules secreted by bacteria and recognized by hunting amoebae, it elicited a very specific and restricted transcriptional signature, distinct from that triggered by any bacteria analyzed here. Our results indicate that D. discoideum amoebae respond in a highly specific, almost non-overlapping manner to different species of bacteria. We additionally identify specific sets of genes that can be used as reporters of the response of D. discoideum to different bacteria.
Project description:This model is from the article:
The influence of cytokinin-auxin cross-regulation on cell-fate determination in Arabidopsis thaliana root development
Muraro D, Byrne H, King J, Voss U, Kieber J, Bennett M.
J Theor Biol.2011 Aug 21;283(1):152-67.
PMID: 21640126,
Abstract:
Root growth and development in Arabidopsis thaliana are sustained by a specialised zone termed the meristem, which contains a population of dividing and differentiating cells that are functionally analogous to a stem cell niche in animals. The hormones auxin and cytokinin control meristem size antagonistically. Local accumulation of auxin promotes cell division and the initiation of a lateral root primordium. By contrast, high cytokinin concentrations disrupt the regular pattern of divisions that characterises lateral root development, and promote differentiation. The way in which the hormones interact is controlled by a genetic regulatory network. In this paper, we propose a deterministic mathematical model to describe this network and present model simulations that reproduce the experimentally observed effects of cytokinin on the expression of auxin regulated genes. We show how auxin response genes and auxin efflux transporters may be affected by the presence of cytokinin. We also analyse and compare the responses of the hormones auxin and cytokinin to changes in their supply with the responses obtained by genetic mutations of SHY2, which encodes a protein that plays a key role in balancing cytokinin and auxin regulation of meristem size. We show that although shy2 mutations can qualitatively reproduce the effect of varying auxin and cytokinin supply on their response genes, some elements of the network respond differently to changes in hormonal supply and to genetic mutations, implying a different, general response of the network. We conclude that an analysis based on the ratio between these two hormones may be misleading and that a mathematical model can serve as a useful tool for stimulate further experimental work by predicting the response of the network to changes in hormone levels and to other genetic mutations.
Project description:We used scRNA-seq to examine cell type allometry in asexual planarians. We profiled 28,738 single cell transcriptomes of planarian of 3 different sizes categories: small (S), medium (M) and large (L). We detected changes in cell type frequency and gene expression patterns in planarian of different sizes, capturing regulatory programs of distinct cell types in response to allometric scaling.
2023-11-06 | GSE246681 | GEO
Project description:Skin and gut microbiomes respond differently to radionuclide contamination
| PRJEB28050 | ENA
Project description:Microbial communities in different particle sizes
Project description:The biological functions of differently expressed proteins between superior and inferior spikelet grains were investigated based on the isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantification to further clarify the mechanism of rice grain filling at the proteomic level, as well as the response of inferior spikelets to drought dress (-20 kPa or -40 kPa). Compared with superior spikelets, inferior ones had lower sink strength due to the lower sink activities (lower expressions of ADP-glucose pyrophosphorylase, granule-bound starch synthase, starch branching enzyme and pullulanase) and smaller sink sizes (lower abundances of structural proteins). The slower and later grain filling resulted from the weaker decomposition and conversion of photoassimilate and the slower cell division. Moderate drought stress (-20 kPa) promoted the grain filling of inferior spikelets through regulating the proteins associated with photoassimilate supply and conversion. These proteins may be important targets for rice breeding programs that raise the rice yield under drought condition. The findings offer new insights into rice grain-filling and provide theoretical evidences for better quality control and scientific improvement of super rice in practice.
Project description:Folate, a water-soluble vitamin, is a key source of one-carbon groups for DNA methylation, but studies of the DNA methylation response to supplemental folic acid yield inconsistent results. The aim of this study was to determine if DNA methylation patterns in the dominant white blood cell type, neutrophils, would respond differently than whole blood in response to chronic folic acid supplementation. Saliva and blood methylation was clearly distinguishable though there was positive correlation overall. There was little correlation in CpG sites within relevant candidate genes. Correlated CpG sites were more likely to occur in areas of low CpG density (i.e. CpG shores and open seas). There was more variability in CpG sites from saliva than blood, which may reflect its heterogeneity. Thus, this study provides a framework for using DNA methylation from saliva and suggests that DNA methylation of saliva may offer distinct opportunities for epidemiological and longitudinal studies of psychiatric traits.