Project description:RNA-binding proteins are key players in coordinated post-transcriptional regulation of functionally related genes, defined as RNA regulons. RNA regulons play particularly critical roles in parasitic trypanosomes, which exhibit unregulated co-transcription of long unrelated gene arrays. In this report, we present a systematic analysis of an essential RNA-binding protein, RBP42, in the mammalian-infective bloodstream form of African trypanosome, and show that RBP42 is a key regulator of parasite’s central carbon and energy metabolism. Using individual-nucleotide resolution UV cross-linking and immunoprecipitation (iCLIP) to identify genome-wide RBP42-RNA interactions, we show that RBP42 preferentially binds within the coding region of mRNAs encoding core metabolic enzymes. Global quantitative transcriptomic and proteomic analyses reveal that loss of RBP42 reduces the abundance of target mRNA-encoded proteins, but not target mRNA, suggesting a positive translational regulatory role of RBP42. Significant changes in central carbon metabolic intermediates, following loss of RBP42, further support its critical role in cellular energy metabolism.
Project description:Diatoms are responsible for ~40% of marine primary productivity1, fueling the oceanic carbon cycle and contributing to natural carbon sequestration in the deep ocean2. Diatoms rely on energetically expensive carbon concentrating mechanisms (CCMs) to fix carbon efficiently at modern levels of CO23–5. How diatoms may respond over the short and long-term to rising atmospheric CO2 remains an open question. Here we use nitrate-limited chemostats to show that the model diatom Thalassiosira pseudonana rapidly responds to increasing CO2 by differentially expressing gene clusters that regulate transcription and chromosome folding and subsequently reduces transcription of photosynthesis and respiration gene clusters under steady-state elevated CO2. These results suggest that exposure to elevated CO2 first causes a shift in regulation and then a metabolic rearrangement. Genes in one CO2-responsive cluster included CCM and photorespiration genes that share a putative cyclic-AMP responsive cis-regulatory sequence, implying these genes are co-regulated in response to CO2 with cAMP as an intermediate messenger. We verified cAMP-induced down-regulation of CCM gene δ-CA3 in nutrient-replete diatom cultures by inhibiting the hydrolysis of cAMP. These results indicate an important role for cAMP in down-regulating CCM and photorespiration genes under elevated CO2 and provide insights into mechanisms of diatom acclimation in response to climate change.