Biology subjects

Heineike, B. M.

Publications and source records attributed to Heineike, B. M..

5 recordsLinked to original sources

bioRxiv2024

The Role of Metabolism in Shaping Enzyme Structures Over 400 Million Years of Evolution

The functions of cells and proteins depend on their biochemical microenvironment. To understand how biochemical constraints shaped protein structural evolution, we coupled the extensive genetic and metabolic data from the Saccharomycotina subphylum with the capability of AlphaFold2 to systematically predict protein structures from sequence. Determining how 11,269 enzyme structures catalysing 361 different metabolic reactions evolved over 400 million years alongside their molecular functions, we report that metabolism has shaped the structural evolution of enzymes at different levels: the organisms overall metabolism; the topological organisation of the metabolic network; and each enzymes molecular properties. For example, structural evolution depends on each enzymes reaction mechanism, on the variability rather than the amount of metabolic flux, and on biosynthetic cost. Evolutionary cost-optimization is stronger on highly abundant enzymes and acts differently on different structural domains, with the exception of small-molecule binding sites, which are prioritised over other structural domains and lack cost-optimisation. Finally, while enzyme surfaces are less constrained, surface residues can also be exposed to positive selection for the co-evolution of protein-protein interaction sites. Accessing AlphaFolds power to predict protein structures systematically and across species barriers, facilitating the integration of protein structures with functional genomics, we were thus able to map biological constraints which shape protein structural evolution at scale and over long timelines.

systems biology↗

bioRxiv2023

Genetic and environmental determinants of multicellular-like phenotypes in fission yeast

Multicellular fungi have repeatedly given rise to primarily unicellular yeast species. Some of these, including Schizosaccharomyces pombe, are able to revert to multicellular-like phenotypes (MLP). Our bioinformatic analysis of existing data suggested that, besides some regulatory proteins, most proteins involved in MLP formation are not functionally conserved between S. pombe and budding yeast. We developed high-throughput assays for two types of MLP in S. pombe: flocculation and surface adhesion, which correlated in minimal medium, suggesting a common mechanism. Using a library of 57 natural S. pombe isolates, we found MLP formation to widely vary across different nutrient and drug conditions. Next, in a segregant S. pombe library generated from an adhesive natural isolate and the standard laboratory strain, MLP formation correlated with expression levels of the transcription-factor gene mbx2 and several flocculins. Quantitative trait locus mapping of MLP formation located a causal frameshift mutation in the srb11 gene encoding cyclin C, a part of the Cdk8 kinase module (CKM) of the Mediator complex. Other CKM deletions also resulted in MLP formation, consistently through upregulation of mbx2, and only in minimal media. We screened a library of 3721 gene-deletion strains, uncovering additional genes involved in surface adhesion on minimal media. We identified 31 high-confidence hits, including 19 genes that have not been associated with MLPs in fission or budding yeast. Notably, deletion of srb11, unlike deletions of the 31 hits, did not compromise cell growth, which might explain its natural occurrence as a QTL for MLP formation.

genetics↗

bioRxiv2022

Inorganic sulfur fixation via a new homocysteine synthase allows yeast cells to cooperatively compensate for methionine auxotrophy

The assimilation, incorporation, and metabolism of sulfur is a fundamental process across all domains of life, yet how cells deal with varying sulfur availability is not well understood. We studied an unresolved conundrum of sulfur fixation in yeast, in which an organosulfur-auxotrophy caused by deletion of homocysteine synthase Met17p is overcome when cells are inoculated at high cell density. We discovered that an uncharacterized gene YLL058Wp, herein named Hydrogen sulfide utilizing-1 (HSU1), acts as a homocysteine synthase and allows the cells to substitute for Met17p by re-assimilating hydrosulfide ions leaked from met17{Delta} cells into O-acetyl-homoserine and forming homocysteine. Our results show that cells can cooperate to achieve sulfur fixation, indicating that the collective properties of microbial communities facilitate their basic metabolic capacity. SummarySulfur limitation activates a dormant hydrogen sulfide fixation route via a novel homocysteine synthase Hsu1p (YLL058Wp).

molecular biology↗

bioRxiv2019

Paralogs in the PKA regulon traveled different evolutionary routes to divergent expression in budding yeast.

Functional divergence of duplicate genes, or paralogs, is an important driver of novelty in evolution. In the model yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, there are 547 paralog gene pairs that survive from an interspecies Whole Genome Hybridization (WGH) that occurred [~]100MYA. Many WGH paralogs (or ohnologs) are known to have differential expression during the yeast Environmental Stress Response (ESR), of which Protein Kinase A (PKA) is a major regulator. While investigating the transcriptional response to PKA inhibition in S. cerevisiae, we discovered that approximately 1/6th (91) of all ohnolog pairs were differentially expressed with a striking pattern. One member of each pair tended to have low basal expression that increased upon PKA inhibition, while the other tended to have high but unchanging expression. Examination of PKA inhibition data in the pre-WGH species K. lactis and PKA-related stresses in other budding yeasts indicated that unchanging expression in response to PKA inhibition is likely to be the ancestral phenotype prior to duplication. Analysis of promoter sequences of orthologs of gene pairs that are differentially expressed in S. cerevisiae further revealed that the emergence of PKA-dependence took different evolutionary routes. In some examples, regulation by PKA and differential expression appears to have arisen following the WGH, while in others, regulation by PKA appears to have arisen in one of the two parental lineages prior to the WGH. More broadly, our results illustrate the unique opportunities presented by a WGH event for generating functional divergence by bringing together two parental lineages with separately evolved regulation into one species. We propose that functional divergence of two ohnologs can be facilitated through such regulatory divergence, which can persist even when functional differences are erased by gene conversion.

evolutionary biology↗

bioRxiv2018

Controlling CRISPR-Cas9 with ligand-activated and ligand-deactivated sgRNAs

The CRISPR-Cas9 system provides the ability to edit, repress, activate, or mark any gene (or DNA element) by pairing of a programmable single guide RNA (sgRNA) with a complementary sequence on the DNA target. Here we present a new method for small-molecule control of CRISPR-Cas9 function through insertion of RNA aptamers into the sgRNA. We show that CRISPR-Cas9-based gene repression (CRISPRi) can be either activated or deactivated in a dose-dependent fashion over a >10-fold dynamic range in response to two different small-molecule ligands. Since our system acts directly on each target-specific sgRNA, it enables new applications that require differential and opposing temporal control of multiple genes.

synthetic biology↗