scholarly journals Evolution of Terpene Synthases in Orchidaceae

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (13) ◽  
pp. 6947
Author(s):  
Li-Min Huang ◽  
Hsin Huang ◽  
Yu-Chen Chuang ◽  
Wen-Huei Chen ◽  
Chun-Neng Wang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Volatile Compounds ◽  
Plant Secondary Metabolites ◽  
Flowering Plants ◽  
Chemical Defenses ◽  
Dependent Manner ◽  
Genome Sequences ◽  
Terpene Synthases ◽  
Orchid Species ◽  
Pharmaceutical Agents ◽  
Defense Function

Terpenoids are the largest class of plant secondary metabolites and are one of the major emitted volatile compounds released to the atmosphere. They have functions of attracting pollinators or defense function, insecticidal properties, and are even used as pharmaceutical agents. Because of the importance of terpenoids, an increasing number of plants are required to investigate the function and evolution of terpene synthases (TPSs) that are the key enzymes in terpenoids biosynthesis. Orchidacea, containing more than 800 genera and 28,000 species, is one of the largest and most diverse families of flowering plants, and is widely distributed. Here, the diversification of the TPSs evolution in Orchidaceae is revealed. A characterization and phylogeny of TPSs from four different species with whole genome sequences is available. Phylogenetic analysis of orchid TPSs indicates these genes are divided into TPS-a, -b, -e/f, and g subfamilies, and their duplicated copies are increased in derived orchid species compared to that in the early divergence orchid, A. shenzhenica. The large increase of both TPS-a and TPS-b copies can probably be attributed to the pro-duction of different volatile compounds for attracting pollinators or generating chemical defenses in derived orchid lineages; while the duplications of TPS-g and TPS-e/f copies occurred in a species-dependent manner.

scholarly journals The Gut Microbiota in Camellia Weevils Are Influenced by Plant Secondary Metabolites and Contribute to Saponin Degradation

mSystems ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shouke Zhang ◽  
Jinping Shu ◽  
Huaijun Xue ◽  
Wei Zhang ◽  
Yabo Zhang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Secondary Metabolites ◽  
Microbial Communities ◽  
Bacterial Communities ◽  
Insect Pest ◽  
Plant Secondary Metabolites ◽  
Sole Source ◽  
Chemical Defenses ◽  
Plant Interactions ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Tea Saponin

ABSTRACT The camellia weevil (CW [Curculio chinensis]) is a notorious host-specific predator of the seeds of Camellia species in China, causing seed losses of up to 60%. The weevil is capable of overcoming host tree chemical defenses, while the mechanisms of how these beetles contend with the toxic compounds are still unknown. Here, we examined the interaction between the gut microbes of CW and camellia seed chemistry and found that beetle-associated bacterial symbionts mediate tea saponin degradation. We demonstrate that the gut microbial community profile of CW was significantly plant associated, and the gut bacterial community associated with CW feeding on Camellia oleifera seeds is enriched with genes involved in tea saponin degradation compared with those feeding on Camellia sinensis and Camellia reticulata seeds. Twenty-seven bacteria from the genera Enterobacter, Serratia, Acinetobacter, and Micrococcus subsisted on tea saponin as a sole source of carbon and nitrogen, and Acinetobacter species are identified as being involved in the degradation of tea saponin. Our results provide the first metagenome of gut bacterial communities associated with a specialist insect pest of Camellia trees, and the results are consistent with a potential microbial contribution to the detoxification of tree-defensive chemicals. IMPORTANCE The gut microbiome may play an important role in insect-plant interactions mediated by plant secondary metabolites, but the microbial communities and functions of toxic plant feeders are still poorly characterized. In the present study, we provide the first metagenome of gut bacterial communities associated with a specialist weevil feeding on saponin-rich and saponin-low camellia seeds, and the results reveal the correlation between bacterial diversity and plant allelochemicals. We also used cultured microbes to establish their saponin-degradative capacity outside the insect. Our results provide new experimental context to better understand how gut microbial communities are influenced by plant secondary metabolites and how the resistance mechanisms involving microbes have evolved to deal with the chemical defenses of plants.

scholarly journals Plant Chemical Defenses: Are all Constitutive Antimicrobial Metabolites Phytoanticipins?

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 1934578X1501000 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Soledade C. Pedras ◽  
Estifanos E. Yaya
Keyword(s):  
Plant Secondary Metabolites ◽  
Chemical Defenses ◽  
Current Evidence ◽  
Plant Metabolites ◽  
Microbial Diseases ◽  
Fatty Acid Derivatives ◽  
Plant Chemical ◽  
Metabolic Products ◽  
Antimicrobial Metabolites ◽  
Chemical Groups

A critical perspective on phytoanticipins, constitutive plant secondary metabolites with defensive roles against microbes is presented. This mini-review focuses on the chemical groups and structural types of defensive plant metabolites thus far not reviewed from the phytoanticipin perspective: i) fatty acid derivatives and polyketides, ii) terpenoids, iii) shikimates, phenylpropanoids and derivatives, and iv) benzylisoquinoline and pyrrolizidine alkaloids. The more traditional groups of phytoanticipins are briefly summarized, with particular focus on the latest results: i) benzoxazinoids, ii) cyanogenic glycosides, iii) glucosinolates and their metabolic products, and iv) saponins. Current evidence suggests that a better understanding of the functions of plant metabolites will drive their application to protect crops against microbial diseases.

scholarly journals Microbial-type terpene synthase genes occur widely in nonseed land plants, but not in seed plants

2016 ◽  
Vol 113 (43) ◽  
pp. 12328-12333 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qidong Jia ◽  
Guanglin Li ◽  
Tobias G. Köllner ◽  
Jianyu Fu ◽  
Xinlu Chen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Flowering Plants ◽  
Terpene Synthase ◽  
Seed Plants ◽  
Terpene Synthases ◽  
The Third ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Prenyl Diphosphate ◽  
Bacteria And Fungi ◽  
Selaginella Moellendorffii ◽  
Catalytic Functions

The vast abundance of terpene natural products in nature is due to enzymes known as terpene synthases (TPSs) that convert acyclic prenyl diphosphate precursors into a multitude of cyclic and acyclic carbon skeletons. Yet the evolution of TPSs is not well understood at higher levels of classification. Microbial TPSs from bacteria and fungi are only distantly related to typical plant TPSs, whereas genes similar to microbial TPS genes have been recently identified in the lycophyte Selaginella moellendorffii. The goal of this study was to investigate the distribution, evolution, and biochemical functions of microbial terpene synthase-like (MTPSL) genes in other plants. By analyzing the transcriptomes of 1,103 plant species ranging from green algae to flowering plants, putative MTPSL genes were identified predominantly from nonseed plants, including liverworts, mosses, hornworts, lycophytes, and monilophytes. Directed searching for MTPSL genes in the sequenced genomes of a wide range of seed plants confirmed their general absence in this group. Among themselves, MTPSL proteins from nonseed plants form four major groups, with two of these more closely related to bacterial TPSs and the other two to fungal TPSs. Two of the four groups contain a canonical aspartate-rich “DDxxD” motif. The third group has a “DDxxxD” motif, and the fourth group has only the first two “DD” conserved in this motif. Upon heterologous expression, representative members from each of the four groups displayed diverse catalytic functions as monoterpene and sesquiterpene synthases, suggesting these are important for terpene formation in nonseed plants.

scholarly journals Investigation of Two Distinct Flavone Synthases for Plant-Specific Flavone Biosynthesis in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

2005 ◽  
Vol 71 (12) ◽  
pp. 8241-8248 ◽  
Author(s):  
Effendi Leonard ◽  
Yajun Yan ◽  
Kok Hong Lim ◽  
Mattheos A. G. Koffas
Keyword(s):  
Saccharomyces Cerevisiae ◽  
Recombinant Strain ◽  
Plant Secondary Metabolites ◽  
Dependent Manner ◽  
Recombinant Yeast Strain ◽  
Membrane Bound ◽  
Flavone Synthase ◽  
Flavone Synthase Ii ◽  
Dose Dependent

ABSTRACT Flavones are plant secondary metabolites that have wide pharmaceutical and nutraceutical applications. We previously constructed a recombinant flavanone pathway by expressing in Saccharomyces cerevisiae a four-step recombinant pathway that consists of cinnamate-4 hydroxylase, 4-coumaroyl:coenzyme A ligase, chalcone synthase, and chalcone isomerase. In the present work, the biosynthesis of flavones by two distinct flavone synthases was evaluated by introducing a soluble flavone synthase I (FSI) and a membrane-bound flavone synthase II (FSII) into the flavanone-producing recombinant yeast strain. The resulting recombinant strains were able to convert various phenylpropanoid acid precursors into the flavone molecules chrysin, apigenin, and luteolin, and the intermediate flavanones pinocembrin, naringenin, and eriodictyol accumulated in the medium. Improvement of flavone biosynthesis was achieved by overexpressing the yeast P450 reductase CPR1 in the FSII-expressing recombinant strain and by using acetate rather than glucose or raffinose as the carbon source. Overall, the FSI-expressing recombinant strain produced 50% more apigenin and six times less naringenin than the FSII-expressing recombinant strain when p-coumaric acid was used as a precursor phenylpropanoid acid. Further experiments indicated that unlike luteolin, the 5,7,4′-trihydroxyflavone apigenin inhibits flavanone biosynthesis in vivo in a nonlinear, dose-dependent manner.

Phylogeny of flowering plants by the chloroplast genome sequences: in search of a “lucky gene”

2007 ◽  
Vol 72 (12) ◽  
pp. 1324-1330 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. D. Logacheva ◽  
A. A. Penin ◽  
T. H. Samigullin ◽  
C. M. Vallejo-Roman ◽  
A. S. Antonov
Keyword(s):  
Chloroplast Genome ◽  
Flowering Plants ◽  
Genome Sequences

scholarly journals The co-evolution of people, plants, and parasites: biological and cultural adaptations to malaria

2003 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 311-317 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nina L. Etkin
Keyword(s):  
Medicinal Plants ◽  
Plant Secondary Metabolites ◽  
Darwinian Evolution ◽  
Cultural Adaptations ◽  
Research Attention ◽  
Genetic Traits ◽  
Human Effort ◽  
Pharmaceutical Agents ◽  
Glucose 6 Phosphate Dehydrogenase ◽  
Drug Resistant Strains

The urgency generated by drug-resistant strains of malaria has accelerated anti-malarial drug research over the last two decades. While synthetic pharmaceutical agents continue to dominate research, attention increasingly has been directed to natural products. The present paper explores the larger context in which plant use occurs and considers how the selection of medicinal plants has evolved over millennia as part of the larger human effort to mediate illness. First attention is directed to indigenous medicinal plants whose anti-malarial activity is based on an oxidant mode of action, by which intracellular constituents lose electrons (become more electropositive). Next, parallels are drawn between these plant substances and a suite of malaria-protective genetic traits: glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency; haemoglobins S, C and E; α- and β-thalassemias. These erythrocyte anomalies are classic examples of Darwinian evolution, occurring in high frequency in populations who have experienced considerable selective pressure from malaria. Characterized by discrete loci and pathophysiologies, they are united through the phenomenon of increased erythrocyte oxidation. In this model, then, oxidant anti-malarial plants are culturally constructed analogues, and molecular mimics, of these genetic adaptations. To further reinforce the scheme, it is noted that the anti-malarial action of pharmaceutical agents such as chloroquine and mefloquine duplicates both the genetic anomalies and the folk therapeutic models based in oxidant plants. This discussion coheres around a theoretical foundation that relates plant secondary metabolites (oxidants) to plasmodial biochemistry and human biological and cultural adaptations to malaria. Co-evolution provides a theoretical link that illuminates how medical cultures manage the relationships among humans, plants, herbivores and their respective pathogens.

Effect of pollen age on fruit set, fruit weight, and seed set in three orchid species

1998 ◽  
Vol 76 (3) ◽  
pp. 420-427 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heather C Proctor
Keyword(s):  
Laboratory Tests ◽  
Fruit Set ◽  
Seed Set ◽  
Fertilization Success ◽  
Fruit Weight ◽  
Flowering Plants ◽  
Orchid Species ◽  
The Third ◽  
Pollen Longevity ◽  
Species Specific

The length of time that pollen remains viable after being removed from the anther may be subject to species-specific selection pressures, e.g., when the average transit time between anther and stigma is long, long-lived pollen may be favoured. Flowering plants that provide no reward to pollinators are predicted to have relatively long-lived pollen, because pollinators are less likely to immediately revisit flowers of a nonrewarding species. I studied the effect of pollen age on fertilization success in three species of orchids that provide little or no reward. Pollen was aged 0, 1, 2, 4, or 8 days outside of the anther and then placed on the stigmas of conspecific flowers. I collected and weighed all resultant fruits and used a subsampling technique to determine the number of embryonated seeds per fruit and the percentage of all seeds that had embryos. There was no evidence that pollen age affected fruit set, fruit weight, embryonated-seed number, or percentage of embryonated seeds in two species (Calopogon tuberosus (Linn.) Britton and Pogonia ophioglossoides (Linn.) Ker.). In the third, Cypripedium reginae Walt., 8-day-old pollen produced significantly lighter fruits with fewer embryonated seeds; however, the percentage of embryonated seeds was not affected. Although the pollen of these nonrewarding orchids appears to have an impressive life-span, it is difficult to make comparisons with other species because most previous studies have relied on laboratory tests of viability that appear to have little relation to performance of pollen in the field.Key words: pollen longevity, Orchidaceae, reproductive success.

scholarly journals The complete chloroplast genome sequences of an endangered orchid species Paphiopedilum parishii (Orchidaceae)

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (9) ◽  
pp. 2521-2522
Author(s):  
Kao Huixia ◽  
Yuxin Zhao ◽  
Mingqi Yang ◽  
Yongjiang Sun ◽  
Jin Cheng
Keyword(s):  
Chloroplast Genome ◽  
Genome Sequences ◽  
Orchid Species ◽  
Complete Chloroplast Genome ◽  
Endangered Orchid

scholarly journals Chemical Characterization and Evaluation of Anticancer Effect of Falcaria vulgaris via Induction of Apoptosis

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kamran Hosseini ◽  
Sanaz Jasori ◽  
Abbas Delazar ◽  
Parina Asgharian ◽  
Vahideh Tarhriz
Keyword(s):  
Essential Oil ◽  
Volatile Compounds ◽  
Cytotoxic Effect ◽  
Intestinal Inflammation ◽  
Hexane Extract ◽  
Gastric Ulcers ◽  
Dependent Manner ◽  
Soxhlet Apparatus ◽  
Falcaria Vulgaris ◽  
Induction Of Apoptosis

Abstract Background: Apiaceae family is one of the plant families which used for medical investigation. Falcaria vulgaris is a clear example of this genus that grows in certain regions of Iran. In traditional medicine, due to the presence of coumarin and flavonoid compounds in this plant, therapeutic properties such as gastrointestinal and liver diseases, skin ulcers, gastric ulcers and intestinal inflammation have been reported. It has also been found that these compounds lead to cytotoxic effects. Objective: The aim of this study aimed to investigate the cytotoxic effect and induction of apoptosis by various extracts and essential oil of F. vulgaris on cancerous cell (SW-872) and to identify the volatile compounds of effective samples. Methods: The shoot of the plant was extracted by Soxhlet apparatus and its essential oil was taken by Clevenger apparatus. The cytotoxicity of the samples was evaluated by MTT method and the mechanism of cancer cell death by flow cytometry and finally, the volatile compounds of essential oils and effective extracts were identified by GC-MS. Results: The results showed that n-Hexane extract and 40% VLC fraction had the greatest cytotoxic effect on SW-872 cells. While, the most abundant volatile compounds in essential oil and 40% VLC fraction of n-Hexane extract are terpenoid compounds like (+) spathulenol and caryophyllene oxide, in n-Hexane extract tetradecan, and spathulenol are the most, respectively. Conclusion: In sum, it was found that the fraction of 40% n-Hexane is in a concentration-dependent manner and significantly with controlling cells, inhibit the growth of cancer cells. This effect is through induction of apoptosis and due to the presence of effective volatile compounds such as terpenoids and non-terpenoids which can be considered as the valuable natural sources for the isolation of anti-cancer compounds.

Plant Secondary Metabolite Diversity and Species Interactions

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
André Kessler ◽  
Aino Kalske
Keyword(s):  
Species Interactions ◽  
Complex Traits ◽  
Information Transfer ◽  
Plant Secondary Metabolites ◽  
Plant Secondary Metabolite ◽  
Chemical Information ◽  
Complex Data ◽  
Dependent Manner ◽  
Ecological Processes ◽  
Mutualistic Interaction

Ever since the first plant secondary metabolites (PSMs) were isolated and identified, questions about their ecological functions and diversity have been raised. Recent advances in analytical chemistry and complex data computation, as well as progress in chemical ecology from mechanistic to functional and evolutionary questions, open a new box of hypotheses. Addressing these hypotheses includes the measurement of complex traits, such as chemodiversity, in a context-dependent manner and allows for a deeper understanding of the multifunctionality and functional redundancy of PSMs. Here we review a hypothesis framework that addresses PSM diversity on multiple ecological levels (α, β, and γ chemodiversity), its variation in space and time, and the potential agents of natural selection. We use the concept of chemical information transfer as mediator of antagonistic and mutualistic interaction to interpret functional and microevolutionary studies and create a hypothesis framework for understanding chemodiversity as a factor driving ecological processes.

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