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Wang B, Liu X, Li Z, Zeng K, Guo J, Xin T, Zhang Z, Li JF, Yang X. A nuclease-dead Cas9-derived tool represses target gene expression. PLANT PHYSIOLOGY 2024; 195:1880-1892. [PMID: 38478589 DOI: 10.1093/plphys/kiae149] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/06/2023] [Accepted: 02/24/2024] [Indexed: 06/30/2024]
Abstract
Manipulation of gene expression is central to understanding gene function, engineering cell behavior, and altering biological traits according to production demands. Nuclease-dead Cas9 (dCas9), a variant of active Cas9, offers a versatile platform for the precise control of genome function without DNA cleavage. Notably, however, an effective and universal dCas9-based transcriptional repression system remains unavailable in plants. The noncanonical histone acetyltransferase TENDRIL-LESS (CsTEN) is responsible for chromatin loosening and histone modification in cucumber (Cucumis sativus). In this study, we engineered a gene regulation tool by fusing TEN and its truncated proteins with dCas9. The full-length dCas9-TEN protein substantially repressed gene expression, with the N-terminal domain identified as the core repression domain. We subsequently validated the specificity and efficacy of this system through both transient infection and genetic transformation in cucumber and Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana). The electrophoretic mobility shift assay (EMSA) revealed the ability of the N-terminal domain of TEN to bind to chromatin, which may promote target binding of the dCas9 complex and enhance the transcriptional repression effect. Our tool enriches the arsenal of genetic regulation tools available for precision breeding in crops.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bowen Wang
- State Key Laboratory of Vegetable Biobreeding, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China
- Shenzhen Branch, Guangdong Laboratory of Lingnan Modern Agriculture, Genome Analysis Laboratory of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Shenzhen 518120, China
| | - Xiaolin Liu
- State Key Laboratory of Vegetable Biobreeding, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China
| | - Zhenxiang Li
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Plant Resources, State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, School of Life Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
| | - Kang Zeng
- State Key Laboratory of Vegetable Biobreeding, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China
- College of Horticulture, FAFU-UCR Joint Center for Horticultural Biology and Metabolomics, Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, Fuzhou 350002, China
| | - Jiangyi Guo
- State Key Laboratory of Vegetable Biobreeding, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China
- Engineering Laboratory of Genetic Improvement of Horticultural Crops of Shandong Province, College of Horticulture, Qingdao Agricultural University, Qingdao 266109, China
| | - Tongxu Xin
- State Key Laboratory of Vegetable Biobreeding, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China
| | - Zhen Zhang
- State Key Laboratory of Crop Stress Adaptation and Improvement, College of Agriculture, Henan University, Kaifeng 475004, China
| | - Jian-Feng Li
- Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Plant Resources, State Key Laboratory of Biocontrol, School of Life Sciences, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou 510275, China
| | - Xueyong Yang
- State Key Laboratory of Vegetable Biobreeding, Institute of Vegetables and Flowers, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing 100081, China
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Candela-Ferre J, Diego-Martin B, Pérez-Alemany J, Gallego-Bartolomé J. Mind the gap: Epigenetic regulation of chromatin accessibility in plants. PLANT PHYSIOLOGY 2024; 194:1998-2016. [PMID: 38236303 PMCID: PMC10980423 DOI: 10.1093/plphys/kiae024] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/09/2023] [Revised: 11/07/2023] [Accepted: 11/23/2023] [Indexed: 01/19/2024]
Abstract
Chromatin plays a crucial role in genome compaction and is fundamental for regulating multiple nuclear processes. Nucleosomes, the basic building blocks of chromatin, are central in regulating these processes, determining chromatin accessibility by limiting access to DNA for various proteins and acting as important signaling hubs. The association of histones with DNA in nucleosomes and the folding of chromatin into higher-order structures are strongly influenced by a variety of epigenetic marks, including DNA methylation, histone variants, and histone post-translational modifications. Additionally, a wide array of chaperones and ATP-dependent remodelers regulate various aspects of nucleosome biology, including assembly, deposition, and positioning. This review provides an overview of recent advances in our mechanistic understanding of how nucleosomes and chromatin organization are regulated by epigenetic marks and remodelers in plants. Furthermore, we present current technologies for profiling chromatin accessibility and organization.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joan Candela-Ferre
- Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (IBMCP), CSIC-Universitat Politècnica de València, Valencia, 46022Spain
| | - Borja Diego-Martin
- Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (IBMCP), CSIC-Universitat Politècnica de València, Valencia, 46022Spain
| | - Jaime Pérez-Alemany
- Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (IBMCP), CSIC-Universitat Politècnica de València, Valencia, 46022Spain
| | - Javier Gallego-Bartolomé
- Instituto de Biología Molecular y Celular de Plantas (IBMCP), CSIC-Universitat Politècnica de València, Valencia, 46022Spain
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Harris CJ, Amtmann A, Ton J. Epigenetic processes in plant stress priming: Open questions and new approaches. CURRENT OPINION IN PLANT BIOLOGY 2023; 75:102432. [PMID: 37523900 DOI: 10.1016/j.pbi.2023.102432] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/29/2023] [Revised: 06/30/2023] [Accepted: 07/03/2023] [Indexed: 08/02/2023]
Abstract
Priming reflects the capacity of plants to memorise environmental stress experience and improve their response to recurring stress. Epigenetic modifications in DNA and associated histone proteins may carry short-term and long-term memory in the same plant or mediate transgenerational effects, but the evidence is still largely circumstantial. New experimental tools now enable scientists to perform targeted manipulations that either prevent or generate a particular epigenetic modification in a particular location of the genome. Such 'reverse epigenetics' approaches allow for the interrogation of causality between individual priming-induced modifications and their role for altering gene expression and plant performance under recurring stress. Furthermore, combining site-directed epigenetic manipulation with conditional and cell-type specific promoters creates novel opportunities to test and engineer spatiotemporal patterns of priming.
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Affiliation(s)
- C Jake Harris
- Department of Plant Sciences, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, CB2 3EA, UK
| | - Anna Amtmann
- School of Molecular Biosciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, G128QQ, UK.
| | - Jurriaan Ton
- School of Biosciences, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, S10 2TN, UK
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García-Murillo L, Valencia-Lozano E, Priego-Ranero NA, Cabrera-Ponce JL, Duarte-Aké FP, Vizuet-de-Rueda JC, Rivera-Toro DM, Herrera-Ubaldo H, de Folter S, Alvarez-Venegas R. CRISPRa-mediated transcriptional activation of the SlPR-1 gene in edited tomato plants. PLANT SCIENCE : AN INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EXPERIMENTAL PLANT BIOLOGY 2023; 329:111617. [PMID: 36731748 DOI: 10.1016/j.plantsci.2023.111617] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/29/2022] [Revised: 01/11/2023] [Accepted: 01/27/2023] [Indexed: 06/18/2023]
Abstract
With the continuous deterioration of arable land due to an ever-growing population, improvement of crops and crop protection have a fundamental role in maintaining and increasing crop productivity. Alternatives to the use of pesticides encompass the use of biological control agents, generation of new resistant crop cultivars, the application of plant activator agrochemicals to enhance plant defenses, and the use of gene editing techniques, like the CRISPR-Cas system. Here, we test the hypothesis that epigenome editing, via CRISPR activation (CRISPRa), activate tomato plant defense genes to confer resistance against pathogen attack. We provide evidence that edited tomato plants for the PATHOGENESIS-RELATED GENE 1 gene (SlPR-1) show enhanced disease resistance to Clavibacter michiganensis subsp. michiganensis infection. Resistance was assessed by evaluating disease progression and symptom appearance, pathogen accumulation, and changes in SlPR-1 gene expression at different time points. We determined that CRISPRa-edited plants develop enhanced disease-resistant to the pathogen without altering their agronomic characteristics and, above all, preventing the advancement of disease symptoms, stem canker, and plant death.
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Affiliation(s)
- Leonardo García-Murillo
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Eliana Valencia-Lozano
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Nicolás Alberto Priego-Ranero
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - José Luis Cabrera-Ponce
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Fátima Patricia Duarte-Aké
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Juan Carlos Vizuet-de-Rueda
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Diana Marcela Rivera-Toro
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Humberto Herrera-Ubaldo
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Stefan de Folter
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
| | - Raúl Alvarez-Venegas
- Center for Research and Advanced Studies of the National Polytechnic Institute, CINVESTAV-IPN, Irapuato, Guanajuato, Mexico.
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Xu Y, Gan ES, Ito T. Misexpression Approaches for the Manipulation of Flower Development. Methods Mol Biol 2023; 2686:429-451. [PMID: 37540372 DOI: 10.1007/978-1-0716-3299-4_21] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 08/05/2023]
Abstract
The generation of dominant gain-of-function mutants through activation tagging is a forward genetic approach that can be applied to study the mechanisms of flower development, complementing the screening of loss-of-function mutants. In addition, the functions of genes of interest can be further analyzed through reverse genetics. A commonly used method is gene overexpression, where ectopic expression can result in an opposite phenotype to that caused by a loss-of-function mutation. When overexpression is detrimental, the misexpression of a gene using tissue-specific promoters can be useful to study spatial-specific function. As flower development is a multistep process, it can be advantageous to control gene expression, or its protein product activity, in a temporal and/or spatial manner. This has been made possible through several inducible promoter systems as well as inducible proteins by constructing chimeric fusions between the ligand-binding domain of the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) and the protein of interest. The recently introduced CRISPR-Cas9-based platform provides a new way of bioengineering transcriptional regulators in plants. By fusing a catalytically inactive dCas9 with functional activation or repression domains, the CRISPR-Cas9 module can achieve transcriptional activation or repression of endogenous genes. All these methods allow us to genetically manipulate gene expression during flower development. In this chapter, we describe methods to produce the expression constructs, method of screening, and more general applications of the techniques.
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Affiliation(s)
- Yifeng Xu
- College of Life Sciences, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China.
| | - Eng-Seng Gan
- Republic Polytechnic, School of Applied Science (SAS), Singapore, Singapore
| | - Toshiro Ito
- Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Biological Sciences, Plant Stem Cell Regulation and Floral Patterning Laboratory, Ikoma, Nara, Japan.
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Current status and future prospects in cannabinoid production through in vitro culture and synthetic biology. Biotechnol Adv 2023; 62:108074. [PMID: 36481387 DOI: 10.1016/j.biotechadv.2022.108074] [Citation(s) in RCA: 29] [Impact Index Per Article: 29.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/28/2022] [Revised: 10/27/2022] [Accepted: 11/30/2022] [Indexed: 12/12/2022]
Abstract
For centuries, cannabis has been a rich source of fibrous, pharmaceutical, and recreational ingredients. Phytocannabinoids are the most important and well-known class of cannabis-derived secondary metabolites and display a broad range of health-promoting and psychoactive effects. The unique characteristics of phytocannabinoids (e.g., metabolite likeness, multi-target spectrum, and safety profile) have resulted in the development and approval of several cannabis-derived drugs. While most work has focused on the two main cannabinoids produced in the plant, over 150 unique cannabinoids have been identified. To meet the rapidly growing phytocannabinoid demand, particularly many of the minor cannabinoids found in low amounts in planta, biotechnology offers promising alternatives for biosynthesis through in vitro culture and heterologous systems. In recent years, the engineered production of phytocannabinoids has been obtained through synthetic biology both in vitro (cell suspension culture and hairy root culture) and heterologous systems. However, there are still several bottlenecks (e.g., the complexity of the cannabinoid biosynthetic pathway and optimizing the bioprocess), hampering biosynthesis and scaling up the biotechnological process. The current study reviews recent advances related to in vitro culture-mediated cannabinoid production. Additionally, an integrated overview of promising conventional approaches to cannabinoid production is presented. Progress toward cannabinoid production in heterologous systems and possible avenues for avoiding autotoxicity are also reviewed and highlighted. Machine learning is then introduced as a powerful tool to model, and optimize bioprocesses related to cannabinoid production. Finally, regulation and manipulation of the cannabinoid biosynthetic pathway using CRISPR- mediated metabolic engineering is discussed.
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Wang S, Yan J, Hu B, Wang R, Xu J. Advanced epigenomic engineering in crop quality improvement. Curr Opin Food Sci 2022. [DOI: 10.1016/j.cofs.2022.100843] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
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