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Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes
Carnivory in plants is an adaptation strategy to nutrient-poor environments and soils. Carnivorous plants obtain some additional mineral nutrients by trapping and digesting prey; the genus Nepenthes is helped by its specialized pitcher traps. To make the nutrients available, the caught prey needs to...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Oxford University Press
2011
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3170555/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21633084 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/jxb/err173 |
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author | Rottloff, Sandy Stieber, Regina Maischak, Heiko Turini, Florian G. Heubl, Günther Mithöfer, Axel |
author_facet | Rottloff, Sandy Stieber, Regina Maischak, Heiko Turini, Florian G. Heubl, Günther Mithöfer, Axel |
author_sort | Rottloff, Sandy |
collection | PubMed |
description | Carnivory in plants is an adaptation strategy to nutrient-poor environments and soils. Carnivorous plants obtain some additional mineral nutrients by trapping and digesting prey; the genus Nepenthes is helped by its specialized pitcher traps. To make the nutrients available, the caught prey needs to be digested, a process that requires the concerted activity of several hydrolytic enzymes. To identify and investigate the various enzymes involved in this process, fluid from Nepenthes traps has been analysed in detail. In this study, a novel type of Nepenthes endochitinase was identified in the digestion fluid of closed pitchers. The encoding endochitinase genes have been cloned from eight different Nepenthes species. Among these, the deduced amino acid sequence similarity was at least 94.9%. The corresponding cDNA from N. rafflesiana was heterologously expressed, and the purified protein, NrChit1, was biochemically characterized. The enzyme, classified as a class III acid endochitinase belonging to family 18 of the glycoside hydrolases, is secreted into the pitcher fluid very probably due to the presence of an N-terminal signal peptide. Transcriptome analyses using real-time PCR indicated that the presence of prey in the pitcher up-regulates the endochitinase gene not only in the glands, which are responsible for enzyme secretion, but at an even higher level, in the glands’ surrounding tissue. These results suggest that in the pitchers’ tissues, the endochitinase as well as other proteins from the pitcher fluid might fulfil a different, primary function as pathogenesis-related proteins. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-3170555 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2011 |
publisher | Oxford University Press |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-31705552011-09-12 Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes Rottloff, Sandy Stieber, Regina Maischak, Heiko Turini, Florian G. Heubl, Günther Mithöfer, Axel J Exp Bot Research Papers Carnivory in plants is an adaptation strategy to nutrient-poor environments and soils. Carnivorous plants obtain some additional mineral nutrients by trapping and digesting prey; the genus Nepenthes is helped by its specialized pitcher traps. To make the nutrients available, the caught prey needs to be digested, a process that requires the concerted activity of several hydrolytic enzymes. To identify and investigate the various enzymes involved in this process, fluid from Nepenthes traps has been analysed in detail. In this study, a novel type of Nepenthes endochitinase was identified in the digestion fluid of closed pitchers. The encoding endochitinase genes have been cloned from eight different Nepenthes species. Among these, the deduced amino acid sequence similarity was at least 94.9%. The corresponding cDNA from N. rafflesiana was heterologously expressed, and the purified protein, NrChit1, was biochemically characterized. The enzyme, classified as a class III acid endochitinase belonging to family 18 of the glycoside hydrolases, is secreted into the pitcher fluid very probably due to the presence of an N-terminal signal peptide. Transcriptome analyses using real-time PCR indicated that the presence of prey in the pitcher up-regulates the endochitinase gene not only in the glands, which are responsible for enzyme secretion, but at an even higher level, in the glands’ surrounding tissue. These results suggest that in the pitchers’ tissues, the endochitinase as well as other proteins from the pitcher fluid might fulfil a different, primary function as pathogenesis-related proteins. Oxford University Press 2011-08 2011-06-01 /pmc/articles/PMC3170555/ /pubmed/21633084 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/jxb/err173 Text en © 2011 The Author(s). This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.5), which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. This paper is available online free of all access charges (see http://jxb.oxfordjournals.org/open_access.html for further details) |
spellingShingle | Research Papers Rottloff, Sandy Stieber, Regina Maischak, Heiko Turini, Florian G. Heubl, Günther Mithöfer, Axel Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes |
title | Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes |
title_full | Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes |
title_fullStr | Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes |
title_full_unstemmed | Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes |
title_short | Functional characterization of a class III acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, Nepenthes |
title_sort | functional characterization of a class iii acid endochitinase from the traps of the carnivorous pitcher plant genus, nepenthes |
topic | Research Papers |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3170555/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21633084 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/jxb/err173 |
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