Project description:The human spliceosome is a large ribonucleoprotein complex that catalyzes pre-mRNA splicing. It consists of five snRNAs and more than 200 proteins. Because of this complexity, much work has focused on the Saccharomyces cerevisiae spliceosome, viewed as a highly simplified system with fewer than half as many splicing factors as humans. Nevertheless, it has been difficult to ascribe a mechanistic function to individual splicing factors or even to discern which are critical for catalyzing the splicing reaction. We have identified and characterized the splicing machinery from the red alga Cyanidioschyzon merolae, which has been reported to harbor only 26 intron-containing genes. The U2, U4, U5, and U6 snRNAs contain expected conserved sequences and have the ability to adopt secondary structures and form intermolecular base-pairing interactions, as in other organisms. C. merolae has a highly reduced set of 43 identifiable core splicing proteins, compared with ∼90 in budding yeast and ∼140 in humans. Strikingly, we have been unable to find a U1 snRNA candidate or any predicted U1-associated proteins, suggesting that splicing in C. merolae may occur without the U1 small nuclear ribonucleoprotein particle. In addition, based on mapping the identified proteins onto the known splicing cycle, we propose that there is far less compositional variability during splicing in C. merolae than in other organisms. The observed reduction in splicing factors is consistent with the elimination of spliceosomal components that play a peripheral or modulatory role in splicing, presumably retaining those with a more central role in organization and catalysis.
Project description:Cyanidioschyzon merolae is considered to be one of the most primitive of eukaryotic photosynthetic organisms. To obtain insights into the origin and evolution of the pathway of carotenoid biosynthesis in eukaryotic plants, the carotenoid content of C. merolae was ascertained, genes encoding enzymes of carotenoid biosynthesis in this unicellular red alga were identified, and the activities of two candidate pathway enzymes of particular interest, lycopene cyclase and beta-carotene hydroxylase, were examined. C. merolae contains perhaps the simplest assortment of chlorophylls and carotenoids found in any eukaryotic photosynthetic organism: chlorophyll a, beta-carotene, and zeaxanthin. Carotenoids with epsilon-rings (e.g., lutein), found in many other red algae and in green algae and land plants, were not detected, and the lycopene cyclase of C. merolae quite specifically produced only beta-ringed carotenoids when provided with lycopene as the substrate in Escherichia coli. Lycopene beta-ring cyclases from several bacteria, cyanobacteria, and land plants also proved to be high-fidelity enzymes, whereas the structurally related epsilon-ring cyclases from several plant species were found to be less specific, yielding products with beta-rings as well as epsilon-rings. C. merolae lacks orthologs of genes that encode the two types of beta-carotene hydroxylase found in land plants, one a nonheme diiron oxygenase and the other a cytochrome P450. A C. merolae chloroplast gene specifies a polypeptide similar to members of a third class of beta-carotene hydroxylases, common in cyanobacteria, but this gene did not produce an active enzyme when expressed in E. coli. The identity of the C. merolae beta-carotene hydroxylase therefore remains uncertain.
Project description:Live cell imaging by fluorescence microscopy is a useful tool for elucidating the localization and function of proteins and organelles in single cells. Especially, time-lapse analysis observing the same field sequentially can be used to observe cells of many organisms and analyze the dynamics of intracellular molecules. By single-cell analysis, it is possible to elucidate the characteristics and fluctuations of individual cells, which cannot be elucidated from the data obtained by averaging the characteristics of an ensemble of cells. The primitive red alga Cyanidioschyzon merolae has a very simple structure and is considered a useful model organism for studying the mechanism of organelle division, since the division is performed synchronously with the cell cycle. However, C. merolae does not have a rigid cell wall, and environmental changes such as low temperature or high pH cause morphological change and disruption easily. Therefore, morphological studies of C. merolae typically use fixed cells. In this study, we constructed a long-term time-lapse observation system to analyze the dynamics of proteins in living C. merolae cells. From the results, we elucidate the cell division process of single living cells, including the function of intracellular components.
Project description:Cyanidioschyzon merolae is an extremophilic red microalga which grows in low-pH, high-temperature environments. The basis of C. merolae's environmental resilience is not fully characterized, including whether this alga uses a carbon-concentrating mechanism (CCM). To determine if C. merolae uses a CCM, we measured CO2 uptake parameters using an open-path infra-red gas analyzer and compared them to values expected in the absence of a CCM. These measurements and analysis indicated that C. merolae had the gas-exchange characteristics of a CCM-operating organism: low CO2 compensation point, high affinity for external CO2, and minimized rubisco oxygenation. The biomass δ13C of C. merolae was also consistent with a CCM. The apparent presence of a CCM in C. merolae suggests the use of an unusual mechanism for carbon concentration, as C. merolae is thought to lack a pyrenoid and gas-exchange measurements indicated that C. merolae primarily takes up inorganic carbon as carbon dioxide, rather than bicarbonate. We use homology to known CCM components to propose a model of a pH-gradient-based CCM, and we discuss how this CCM can be further investigated.
Project description:Chloroplast biogenesis involves the coordinated expression of the plastid and nuclear genomes, requiring information to be sent from the nucleus to the developing chloroplasts and vice versa. Although it is well known how the nucleus controls chloroplast development, it is still poorly understood how the plastid communicates with the nucleus. Currently, haem is proposed as a plastid-to-nucleus (retrograde) signal that is involved in various physiological regulations, such as photosynthesis-associated nuclear genes expression and cell cycle in plants and algae. However, components that transduce haem-dependent signalling are still unidentified. In this study, by using haem-immobilized high-performance affinity beads, we performed proteomic analysis of haem-binding proteins from Arabidopsis thaliana and Cyanidioschyzon merolae. Most of the identified proteins were non-canonical haemoproteins localized in various organelles. Interestingly, half of the identified proteins were nucleus proteins, some of them have a similar function or localization in either or both organisms. Following biochemical analysis of selective proteins demonstrated haem binding. This study firstly demonstrates that nucleus proteins in plant and algae show haem-binding properties. This article is part of the theme issue 'Retrograde signalling from endosymbiotic organelles'.
Project description:In many eukaryotes, cytokinesis proceeds in two successive steps: first, ingression of the cleavage furrow and second, abscission of the intercellular bridge. In animal cells, the actomyosin contractile ring is involved in the first step, while the endosomal sorting complex required for transport (ESCRT), which participates in various membrane fusion/fission events, mediates the second step. Intriguingly, in archaea, ESCRT is involved in cytokinesis, raising the hypothesis that the function of ESCRT in eukaryotic cytokinesis descended from the archaeal ancestor. In eukaryotes other than in animals, the roles of ESCRT in cytokinesis are poorly understood. To explore the primordial core mechanisms for eukaryotic cytokinesis, we investigated ESCRT functions in the unicellular red alga Cyanidioschyzon merolae that diverged early in eukaryotic evolution. C. merolae provides an excellent experimental system. The cell has a simple organelle composition. The genome (16.5 Mb, 5335 genes) has been completely sequenced, transformation methods are established, and the cell cycle is synchronized by a light and dark cycle. Similar to animal and fungal cells, C. merolae cells divide by furrowing at the division site followed by abscission of the intercellular bridge. However, they lack an actomyosin contractile ring. The proteins that comprise ESCRT-I-IV, the four subcomplexes of ESCRT, are partially conserved in C. merolae. Immunofluorescence of native or tagged proteins localized the homologs of the five ESCRT-III components [charged multivesicular body protein (CHMP) 1, 2, and 4-6], apoptosis-linked gene-2-interacting protein X (ALIX), the ESCRT-III adapter, and the main ESCRT-IV player vacuolar protein sorting (VPS) 4, to the intercellular bridge. In addition, ALIX was enriched around the cleavage furrow early in cytokinesis. When the ESCRT function was perturbed by expressing dominant-negative VPS4, cells with an elongated intercellular bridge accumulated-a phenotype resulting from abscission failure. Our results show that ESCRT mediates cytokinetic abscission in C. merolae. The fact that ESCRT plays a role in cytokinesis in archaea, animals, and early diverged alga C. merolae supports the hypothesis that the function of ESCRT in cytokinesis descended from archaea to a common ancestor of eukaryotes.