Project description:Understanding the bacterial community structure, and their functional analysis for active bioremediation process is essential to design better and cost effective strategies. Microarray analysis enables us to simultaneously study the functional and phylogenetic markers of hundreds of microorganisms which are involved in active bioremediation process in an environment. We have previously described development of a hybrid 60-mer multibacterial microarray platform (BiodegPhyloChip) for profiling the bacterial communities and functional genes simultaneously in environments undergoing active bioremediation process (Pathak et al; Appl Microbiol Biotechnol,Vol. 90, 1739-1754). The present study involved profiling the status of bacterial communities and functional (biodegradation) genes using the developed 60-mer oligonucleotide microarray BiodegPhyloChip at five contaminated hotspots in the state of Gujarat, in western India. The expression pattern of functional genes (coding for key enzymes in active bioremediation process) at these sites was studied to understand the dynamics of biodegradation in the presence of diverse group of chemicals. The results indicated that the nature of pollutants and their abundance greatly influence the structure of bacterial communities and the extent of expression of genes involved in various biodegradation pathways. In addition, site specific factors also play a pivotal role to affect the microbial community structure as was evident from results of 16S rRNA gene profiling of the five contaminated sites, where the community structure varied from one site to another drastically.
Project description:Understanding the bacterial community structure, and their functional analysis for active bioremediation process is essential to design better and cost effective strategies. Microarray analysis enables us to simultaneously study the functional and phylogenetic markers of hundreds of microorganisms which are involved in active bioremediation process in an environment. We have previously described development of a hybrid 60-mer multibacterial microarray platform (BiodegPhyloChip) for profiling the bacterial communities and functional genes simultaneously in environments undergoing active bioremediation process (Pathak et al; Appl Microbiol Biotechnol,Vol. 90, 1739-1754). The present study involved profiling the status of bacterial communities and functional (biodegradation) genes using the developed 60-mer oligonucleotide microarray BiodegPhyloChip at five contaminated hotspots in the state of Gujarat, in western India. The expression pattern of functional genes (coding for key enzymes in active bioremediation process) at these sites was studied to understand the dynamics of biodegradation in the presence of diverse group of chemicals. The results indicated that the nature of pollutants and their abundance greatly influence the structure of bacterial communities and the extent of expression of genes involved in various biodegradation pathways. In addition, site specific factors also play a pivotal role to affect the microbial community structure as was evident from results of 16S rRNA gene profiling of the five contaminated sites, where the community structure varied from one site to another drastically. Agilent one-color CGH experiment and one-color Gene Expresssion expereiment,Organism: Genotypic designed Agilent-17159 Genotypic designed Agilent Multibacterial 8x15k Array , Labeling kits: Agilent Genomic DNA labeling Kit (Part Number: 5190-0453) and Agilent Quick Amp Kit PLUS (Part number: 5190-0442).
Project description:Strawberry is economically important and widely grown but susceptible to a large variety of phytopathogenic organisms. Among them, Xanthomonas fragariae is a quarantine bacterial pathogen threatening strawberry productions by causing angular leaf spots. Using whole transcriptome sequencing, gene expression of both plant and bacteria in planta was analyzed at two time points, 12- and 29-days post inoculation, in order to compare pathogen and host response between the stages of early visible and of well-developed symptoms. Among 28’588 known genes in strawberry and 4’046 known genes in X. fragariae expressed at both time points, a total of 361 plant and 144 bacterial genes were significantly differentially expressed, respectively. The identified higher expressed genes in the plants were pathogen-associated molecular pattern receptors and pathogenesis related thaumatin encoding genes, whereas the more expressed early genes were related to chloroplast metabolism as well as photosynthesis related coding genes. Most of X. fragariae genes involved in host interactions, recognitions and pathogenesis, were lower expressed at late-phase infection. This study gives a first insight on the interaction of X. fragariae with its host. The strawberry plant changed its metabolism consistently with the progression of infection.
Project description:In plants, microRNAs (miRNAs) play a critical role in post-transcriptional gene regulation and have been shown to control many genes involved in various biological and metabolic processes. Deep sequencing technologies have facilitated identification of species-specific or lowly expressed as well as conserved or highly expressed miRNAs in plants. Strawberry is one of the most economically important fruit throughout the world.Although miRNAs have been extensively studied in the past five years, limited systematic study of miRNAs has been performed on the Fragaria genus. These results show that regulatory miRNAs exist in agronomically important strawberry and may play an important role in strawberry growth, development, and response to disease. High throughput sequencing was employed to identify miRNAs in strawberry and try to describe their functions in strawberry growth and development
Project description:The characterization of microbial community structure via 16S rRNA gene profiling has been greatly advanced in recent years by the application of amplicon pyrosequencing. The possibility of barcode-tagged sequencing of templates gives the opportunity to massively screen multiple samples from environmental or clinical sources for community details. However, an on-going debate questions the reproducibility and semi-quantitative rigour of pyrotag sequencing and, as in the early days of genetic community fingerprinting, pros and cons are continuously provided. In this study we investigate the reproducibility of bacterial 454 pyrotag sequencing over biological and technical replicates of natural microbiota. Moreover, via quantitatively defined template spiking to the natural community, we explore the potential for recovering specific template ratios within complex microbial communities. For this reason, we pyrotag sequenced three biological replicates of three samples, each belonging from yearly sampling campaigns of sediment from a tar oil contaminated aquifer in Düsseldorf, Germany. Furthermore, we subjected one DNA extract to replicate technical analyses as well as to increasing ratios (0, 0.2, 2 and 20%) of 16S rRNA genes from a pure culture (Aliivibrio fisheri) originally not present in the sample. Unexpectedly, taxa abundances were highly reproducible in our hands, with max standard deviation of ~3% abundance across biological and ~2% for technical replicates. Furthermore, our workflow was also capable of recovering A. fisheri amendmend ratios in reliable amounts (0, 0.29, 3.9 and 23.8%). These results highlight that pyrotag sequencing, if done and evaluated with due caution, has the potential to robustly recapture taxa template abundances within environmental microbial communities. 9 Biological and 3 technical replicates were evaluated, as well as potential to recover qPCR-defined ratios of DNA, in 454 pyrotag sequencing
Project description:High Arctic soils have low nutrient availability, low moisture content and very low temperatures and, as such, they pose a particular problem in terms of hydrocarbon bioremediation. An in-depth knowledge of the microbiology involved in this process is likely to be crucial to understand and optimize the factors most influencing bioremediation. Here, we compared two distinct large-scale field bioremediation experiments, located at Alert (ex situ approach) and Eureka (in situ approach), in the Canadian high Arctic. Bacterial community structure and function were assessed using microarrays targeting the 16S rRNA genes of bacteria found in cold environments and hydrocarbon degradation genes as well as reverse-transcriptase real-time PCR targeting key functional genes. Results indicated a large difference between sampling sites in terms of both soil microbiology and decontamination rates. A rapid reorganization of the bacterial community structure and functional potential as well as rapid increases in the expression of alkane monooxygenases and polyaromatic hydrocarbon ring-hydroxylating-dioxygenases were observed one month after the bioremediation treatment commenced in the Alert soils. In contrast, no clear changes in community structure were observed in Eureka soils, while key gene expression increased after a relatively long lag period (1 year). Such discrepancies are likely caused by differences in bioremediation treatments (i.e. ex situ vs. in situ), weathering of the hydrocarbons, indigenous microbial communities, and environmental factors such as soil humidity and temperature. In addition, this study demonstrates the value of molecular tools for the monitoring of polar bacteria and their associated functions during bioremediation. 38 soil samples from two high arctic locations that were contaminated-treated, contaminated or not contaminated followed for up to 4 years
Project description:High Arctic soils have low nutrient availability, low moisture content and very low temperatures and, as such, they pose a particular problem in terms of hydrocarbon bioremediation. An in-depth knowledge of the microbiology involved in this process is likely to be crucial to understand and optimize the factors most influencing bioremediation. Here, we compared two distinct large-scale field bioremediation experiments, located at Alert (ex situ approach) and Eureka (in situ approach), in the Canadian high Arctic. Bacterial community structure and function were assessed using microarrays targeting the 16S rRNA genes of bacteria found in cold environments and hydrocarbon degradation genes as well as reverse-transcriptase real-time PCR targeting key functional genes. Results indicated a large difference between sampling sites in terms of both soil microbiology and decontamination rates. A rapid reorganization of the bacterial community structure and functional potential as well as rapid increases in the expression of alkane monooxygenases and polyaromatic hydrocarbon ring-hydroxylating-dioxygenases were observed one month after the bioremediation treatment commenced in the Alert soils. In contrast, no clear changes in community structure were observed in Eureka soils, while key gene expression increased after a relatively long lag period (1 year). Such discrepancies are likely caused by differences in bioremediation treatments (i.e. ex situ vs. in situ), weathering of the hydrocarbons, indigenous microbial communities, and environmental factors such as soil humidity and temperature. In addition, this study demonstrates the value of molecular tools for the monitoring of polar bacteria and their associated functions during bioremediation. 38 soil samples from two high arctic locations that were contaminated-treated, contaminated or not contaminated followed for up to 4 years
Project description:Disrupted interactions between host and intestinal bacteria are implicated in the development of colorectal cancer (CRC). However, the functional impacts of these inter-kingdom interactions remain poorly defined. To examine this interplay, we performed mouse and microbiota RNA-sequencing on colon tissue from germ-free (GF) and gnotobiotic ApcMin/+;Il10-/- mice associated with microbes from biofilm-positive human CRC tumor (BT) and biofilm-negative healthy (BX) tissues. The bacteria in BT mice differentially expressed >2,900 genes related to bacterial secretion, virulence and biofilms, but only affected 62 host genes. Importantly, the bacterial communities from BT mice were transmissible and carcinogenic when administered to a new GF ApcMin/+;Il10-/- cohort, maintaining a set of 13 bacterial genera. Our findings suggest complex interactions within bacterial communities affecting bacterial composition and CRC development.