珠江口沉积物来源链霉菌SCSIO 40020中bafilomycins的鉴定及其生物合成基因簇的异源表达

【目的】从珠江口沉积物来源的菌株SCSIO40020中分离bafilomycins,并对其生物合成基因簇进行克隆和异源表达研究。【方法】通过分析菌株SCSIO 40020的16S rRNA基因序列并构建系统发育树以鉴定菌种,以柱层析法和制备色谱法对次级代谢产物进行分离纯化,借助波谱学手段完成单体化合物的结构鉴定,采用生物信息学分析定位bafilomycins的生物合成基因簇,通过筛选菌株SCSIO 40020基因组的细菌人工染色体文库和接合转移将bafilomycins生物合成基因簇导入3种链霉菌进行异源表达,利用高效液相色谱检测异源表达菌株的发酵产物。【结果】菌株SCSIO 40020被鉴定为链霉菌属菌株,从其发酵产物中分离鉴定了2个单体化合物bafilomycinsA1和D。克隆了链霉菌SCSIO40020中bafilomycins的生物合成基因簇并推导了其生物合成途径,在3种链霉菌中表达产生了bafilomycins。【结论】从珠江口环境中获得了一株产生bafilomycins的链霉菌SCSIO 40020,成功建立了该菌株次级代谢产物生物合成基因簇的异源表达体系,并首次在链霉菌...     

Accurate and Fast Convergent Initial-Value Belief Propagation for Stereo Matching

The belief propagation (BP) algorithm has some limitations, including ambiguous edges and textureless regions, and slow convergence speed. To address these problems, we present a novel algorithm that intrinsically improves both the accuracy and the convergence speed of BP. First, traditional BP generally consumes time due to numerous iterations. To reduce the number of iterations, inspired by the crucial importance of the initial value in nonlinear problems, a novel initial-value belief propagation (IVBP) algorithm is presented, which can greatly improve both convergence speed and accuracy. Second, .the majority of the existing research on BP concentrates on the smoothness term or other energy terms, neglecting the significance of the data term. In this study, a self-adapting dissimilarity data term (SDDT) is presented to improve the accuracy of the data term, which incorporates an additional gradient-based measure into the traditional data term, with the weight determined by the robust measure-based control function. Finally, this study explores the effective combination of local methods and global methods. The experimental results have demonstrated that our method performs well compared with the state-of-the-art BP and simultaneously holds better edge-preserving smoothing effects with fast convergence speed in the Middlebury and new 2014 Middlebury datasets.     

Mutation of an atypical oxirane oxyanion hole improves regioselectivity of the α/β-fold epoxide hydrolase Alp1U

Epoxide hydrolases (EHs) have been characterized and engineered as biocatalysts that convert epoxides to valuable chiral vicinal diol precursors of drugs and bioactive compounds. Nonetheless, the regioselectivity control of the epoxide ring opening by EHs remains challenging. Alp1U is an α/β-fold EH that exhibits poor regioselectivity in the epoxide hydrolysis of fluostatin C (compound 1) and produces a pair of stereoisomers. Herein, we established the absolute configuration of the two stereoisomeric products and determined the crystal structure of Alp1U. A Trp-186/Trp-187/Tyr-247 oxirane oxygen hole was identified in Alp1U that replaced the canonical Tyr/Tyr pair in α/β-EHs. Mutation of residues in the atypical oxirane oxygen hole of Alp1U improved the regioselectivity for epoxide hydrolysis on 1. The single site Y247F mutation led to highly regioselective (98%) attack at C-3 of 1, whereas the double mutation W187F/Y247F resulted in regioselective (94%) nucleophilic attack at C-2. Furthermore, single-crystal X-ray structures of the two regioselective Alp1U variants in complex with 1 were determined. These findings allowed insights into the reaction details of Alp1U and provided a new approach for engineering regioselective epoxide hydrolases.     

Distribution of dTDP-glucose-4,6-dehydratase gene and diversity of potential glycosylated natural products in marine sediment-derived bacteria

To investigate the distribution of dTDP-glucose-4,6-dehydratase (dTGD) gene and diversity of the potential 6-deoxyhexose (6DOH) glycosylated compounds in marine microorganisms, a total of 91 marine sediment-derived bacteria, representing 48 operational taxonomic units and belonging to 25 genera, were screened by polymerase chain reaction. In total, 84% of the strains were dTGD gene positive, suggesting 6DOH biosynthetic pathway is widespread in these marine sediment-derived bacteria. BLASTp results of dTGD gene fragments indicate a high chemical diversity of the potential 6DOH glycosylated compounds. Close phylogenetic relationship occurred between dTGDs involved in the production of same or similar 6DOH glycosylated compounds, suggesting dTGD can be used to predict the structure of potential 6DOH glycosylated compounds produced by new strains. In two cases, where dTGD shared ≥85% amino acid identity and close phylogenetic relationship with their counterparts, 6DOH glycosylated compounds were accurately predicted. Our results demonstrate that phylogenetic analysis of dTGD gene is useful for structure prediction of glycosylated compounds from newly isolated strains and can therefore guide the chemical purification and structure identification process. The rapid identification of strains that possess dTGD gene provides a bioinformatics assessment of the greatest potential to produce glycosylated compounds despite the absence of fully biosynthetic pathways or genome sequences.     

友菌素核苷转移酶amiE基因的克隆、表达和功能鉴定

【目的】克隆和表达二糖核苷类抗生素友菌素生物合成基因簇中的核苷转移酶基因amiE,并研究AmiE的体外催化功能。【方法】采用PCR技术将编码257个氨基酸的葡萄糖-1-磷酸核苷转移酶基因amiE克隆到表达载体pET28a上,构建质粒pCSG4001,转化入大肠杆菌E.coli BL21(DE3)中诱导表达;利用亲和层析分离纯化蛋白AmiE,以葡萄糖-1-磷酸和胸腺嘧啶三磷酸(TTP)或尿嘧啶三磷酸(UTP)为底物,利用高效液相检测AmiE的体外酶活;以甘露糖-1-磷酸、半乳糖胺-1-磷酸和半乳糖-1-磷酸和TTP作为底物,进一步研究AmiE对底物的选择性。【结果】N-末端融合组氨酸标签的AmiE蛋白在大肠杆菌中获得了可溶性表达,通过亲和层析纯化出的AmiE能够以TTP(或UTP)和葡萄糖-1-磷酸作为底物,催化形成胸腺嘧啶二磷酸葡萄糖(TDP-glucose)或者尿嘧啶二磷酸葡萄糖(UDP-glucose),但对其他三种底物,无明显催化活性。【结论】大肠杆菌中表达纯化的核苷转移酶AmiE能够体外催化形成TDP-葡萄糖(或UDP-葡萄糖),确证了AmiE作为核苷转移酶的催化功能,同时表明AmiE对底物具有一定的选择性。     

Promoters of crystal protein genes do not control crystal formation inside exosporium of Bacillus thuringiensis ssp. finitimus strain YBT-020

Oenococcus oeni strains from traditional Italian red wines of the Basilicata region were investigated on the basis of their physiological and molecular response to different temperatures and ethanol concentrations. All strains were highly resistant to different ethanol concentrations and it has been observed that 7% ethanol was able to stimulate the growth of strains in wine, and 12–13% of ethanol allowed their proliferation. Moreover, strain tolerances to 18 and 42 °C were observed. Fingerprinting analysis with fluorescent differential display-PCR and investigation of changes in gene expression during the tolerance process were carried out. The expression gene pattern reflects mechanisms involved in tolerance to environmental conditions. This study establishes and validates a method that enables, with a high reproducibility, different gene expression identification under stress conditions in lactic acid bacteria.     

He—Ne激光穴位照射对兔子宫和卵巢细胞超微结构的作用效应

本文报道了用Ｈｅ—Ｎｅ激光照射新西兰白兔的穴位。照射外生殖器后,兔子宫和卵巢细胞超微结构在形态及数量上发生改变。线粒体数目增多,嵴长且密;高尔基复合体及内质网扩张,同时还观察到较大功率照射实验组内部分细胞膜性结构受损现象。结果表明：适当功率激光照射后,可反映出氧化代谢率高,能量代谢功能活跃。     

格尔德霉素生物合成基因功能的验证

格尔德霉素(Geldanamycin, Gdm)作为热休克蛋白90的特异性抑制剂, 是非常有前景的抗肿瘤和抗病毒的药物,我们已从吸水链霉菌17997(Streptomyces hygroscopicus 17997)的基因文库中获得了Gdm大部分生物合成基因。为了研究主要基因的功能, 选择了聚酮合酶基因(Polyketide synthase gene, pks)的第六模块、单加氧酶基因(Mono-oxygenase gene, gdmM)和氨甲酰基转移酶基因(Carbamoyltransferase gene, gdmN)3个基因作为靶点分别进行基因阻断, 获得了基因同源双交换的阻断变株△pks、△gdmM和△gdmN。经HPLC检测证实这些基因的阻断变株均不产生Gdm, 基因回复实验排除了基因阻断所可能造成的极性效应对其它基因表达的影响, 说明所克隆的pks、gdmM和gdmN基因确实是Gdm生物合成所必须的基因。     

TRUS image segmentation with non-parametric kernel density estimation shape prior

Due to noises, speckles, etc., automatic prostate segmentation is rather challenging, and using only low-level information such as intensity gradient is insufficient and unable to tackle the problem. In this paper, we propose an automatic prostate segmentation method combining intrinsic properties of TRUS images with the high-level shape prior information. First, intrinsic properties of TRUS images, such as the intensity transition near the prostate boundary as well as the speckle induced texture features obtained by Gabor filter banks, are integrated to deform the model to the target contour. These properties make our method insensitive to high gradient regions introduced by noises and speckles. Then, the preliminary segmentation is fine-tuned by the non-parametric shape prior, which is optimally distilled by non-parametric kernel density estimation as it can approximate arbitrary distributions. The refinement is along the direction of mean shift vector, and considerably strengthens the robustness of the method. The performance of our method is validated by experimental results. Compared with the state of the art, the accuracy and robustness of the method is quite promising, and the mean absolute distance is only 1.21 ± 0.85 mm.