scholarly journals Genetic interactions between clock mutations in Neurospora crassa : can they help us to understand complexity?

2001 ◽  
Vol 356 (1415) ◽  
pp. 1717-1724 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louis W. Morgan ◽  
Jerry F. Feldman ◽  
Deborah Bell-Pedersen

Recent work on circadian clocks in Neurospora has primarily focused on the frequency ( frq ) and white–collar ( wc ) loci. However, a number of other genes are known that affect either the period or temperature compensation of the rhythm. These include the period (no relationship to the period gene of Drosophila ) genes and a number of genes that affect cellular metabolism. How these other loci fit into the circadian system is not known, and metabolic effects on the clock are typically not considered in single–oscillator models. Recent evidence has pointed to multiple oscillators in Neurospora , at least one of which is predicted to incorporate metabolic processes. Here, the Neurospora clock–affecting mutations will be reviewed and their genetic interactions discussed in the context of a more complex clock model involving two coupled oscillators: a FRQ/WC–based oscillator and a ‘ frq –less’ oscillator that may involve metabolic components.

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. eabe2086
Author(s):  
Zheng Eelderink-Chen ◽  
Jasper Bosman ◽  
Francesca Sartor ◽  
Antony N. Dodd ◽  
Ákos T. Kovács ◽  
...  

Circadian clocks create a 24-hour temporal structure, which allows organisms to occupy a niche formed by time rather than space. They are pervasive throughout nature, yet they remain unexpectedly unexplored and uncharacterized in nonphotosynthetic bacteria. Here, we identify in Bacillus subtilis circadian rhythms sharing the canonical properties of circadian clocks: free-running period, entrainment, and temperature compensation. We show that gene expression in B. subtilis can be synchronized in 24-hour light or temperature cycles and exhibit phase-specific characteristics of entrainment. Upon release to constant dark and temperature conditions, bacterial biofilm populations have temperature-compensated free-running oscillations with a period close to 24 hours. Our work opens the field of circadian clocks in the free-living, nonphotosynthetic prokaryotes, bringing considerable potential for impact upon biomedicine, ecology, and industrial processes.


2019 ◽  
Vol 243 (3) ◽  
pp. R29-R46 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cátia F Gonçalves ◽  
Qing-Jun Meng

The circadian system in mammals is responsible for the temporal coordination of multiple physiological and behavioural processes that are necessary for homeostasis. In the skeleton, it has long been known that metabolic functions of chondrocytes, osteoblasts and osteoclasts exhibit intrinsic circadian rhythms. In addition, results from animal models reveal a close connection between the disruption of circadian rhythms and skeletal disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis and osteoporosis. In this review, we summarise the latest insights into the genetic and biochemical mechanisms linking cartilage and bone physiology to the circadian clock system. We also discuss how this knowledge can be utilised to improve human health.


2014 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 251-267 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. Sugiura ◽  
T. Hori ◽  
Y. Kawamura

Abstract. A rationale is provided for the emergence of synchronization in a system of coupled oscillators in a stick-slip motion. The single oscillator has a limit cycle in a region of the state space for each parameter set beyond the supercritical Hopf bifurcation. The two-oscillator system that has similar weakly coupled oscillators exhibits synchronization in a parameter range. The synchronization has an anti-phase nature for an identical pair. However, it tends to be more in-phase for a non-identical pair with a rather weak coupling. A system of three identical oscillators (1, 2, and 3) coupled in a line (with two springs k12=k23) exhibits synchronization with two of them (1 and 2 or 2 and 3) being nearly in-phase. These collective behaviours are systematically estimated using the phase reduction method.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shunji Nakamura ◽  
Tokitaka Oyama

The plant circadian system is based on self-sustained cellular oscillations and is utilized to adapt to daily and seasonal environmental changes. The cellular circadian clocks in the above- and belowground plant organs are subjected to diverse local environments. Individual cellular clocks are affected by other cells/tissues in plants, and the intrinsic properties of cellular clocks remain to be elucidated. In this study, we showed the circadian properties of leaf- and root-derived cells of a CCA1::LUC Arabidopsis transgenic plant and demonstrated that the cells in total isolation from other cells harbor a genuine circadian clock. Quantitative and statistical analyses for individual cellular bioluminescence rhythms revealed a difference in amplitude and precision of light/dark entrainment between the two cell-types, suggesting that leaf-derived cells have a clock with a stronger persistence against fluctuating environments. Circadian systems in the leaves and roots are diversified to adapt to their local environments at the cellular level.


2010 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 177-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mirela Domijan ◽  
David A. Rand

We present a new approach to understanding how regulatory networks such as circadian clocks might evolve robustness to environmental fluctuations. The approach is in terms of new balance equations that we derive. We use it to describe how an entrained clock can buffer the effects of daily fluctuations in light and temperature levels. We also use it to study a different approach to temperature compensation where instead of considering a free-running clock, we study temperature buffering of the phases in a light-entrained clock, which we believe is a more physiological setting.


2008 ◽  
Vol 5 (suppl_1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Neda Bagheri ◽  
Stephanie R Taylor ◽  
Kirsten Meeker ◽  
Linda R Petzold ◽  
Francis J Doyle

Systems theoretic tools (i.e. mathematical modelling, control, and feedback design) advance the understanding of robust performance in complex biological networks. We highlight phase entrainment as a key performance measure used to investigate dynamics of a single deterministic circadian oscillator for the purpose of generating insight into the behaviour of a population of (synchronized) oscillators. More specifically, the analysis of phase characteristics may facilitate the identification of appropriate coupling mechanisms for the ensemble of noisy (stochastic) circadian clocks. Phase also serves as a critical control objective to correct mismatch between the biological clock and its environment. Thus, we introduce methods of investigating synchrony and entrainment in both stochastic and deterministic frameworks, and as a property of a single oscillator or population of coupled oscillators.


2001 ◽  
Vol 21 (8) ◽  
pp. 2619-2628 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Collett ◽  
Jay C. Dunlap ◽  
Jennifer J. Loros

ABSTRACT To understand the role of white collar-2 in theNeurospora circadian clock, we examined alleles ofwc-2 thought to encode partially functional proteins. We found that wc-2 allele ER24 contained a conservative mutation in the zinc finger. This mutation results in reduced levels of circadian rhythm-critical clock gene products, frq mRNA and FRQ protein, and in a lengthened period of the circadian clock. In addition, this mutation altered a second canonical property of the clock, temperature compensation: as temperature increased, period length decreased substantially. This temperature compensation defect correlated with a temperature-dependent increase in overall FRQ protein levels, with the relative increase being greater in wc-2(ER24) than in wild type, while overall frq mRNA levels were largely unaltered by temperature. We suggest that this temperature-dependent increase in FRQ levels partially rescues the lowered levels of FRQ resulting from the wc-2 (ER24) defect, yielding a shorter period at higher temperatures. Thus, normal activity of the essential clock component WC-2, a positive regulator offrq, is critical for establishing period length and temperature compensation in this circadian system.


2011 ◽  
Vol 21 (07) ◽  
pp. 1907-1912 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. CHUDZIK ◽  
P. PERLIKOWSKI ◽  
A. STEFANSKI ◽  
T. KAPITANIAK

We discuss the mechanism leading to the multistability in the externally excited van der Pol–Duffing oscillator. It has been shown that the mechanism (the sequence of bifurcations) leading to the phase multistability in coupled oscillators is the same as the mechanism leading to the bistability in the single oscillator.


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