Pab1 acetylation at K131 decreases stress granule formation in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Under environmental stress, such as glucose deprivation, cells form stress granules—the accumulation of cytoplasmic aggregates of repressed translational initiation complexes, proteins, and stalled mRNAs. Recent research implicates stress granules in various diseases, such as neurodegenerative diseases, but the exact regulators responsible for the assembly and disassembly of stress granules are unknown. An important aspect of stress granule formation is the presence of posttranslational modifications on core proteins. One of those modifications is lysine acetylation, which is regulated by either a lysine acetyltransferase or a lysine deacetylase enzyme. This work deciphers the impact of lysine acetylation on an essential protein found in Saccharomyces cerevisiae stress granules, poly(A)-binding protein (Pab1). We demonstrated that an acetylation mimic of the lysine residue in position 131 reduces stress granule formation upon glucose deprivation and other stressors such as ethanol, raffinose, and vanillin. We present genetic evidence that the enzyme Rpd3 is the primary candidate for the deacetylation of Pab1-K131. Further, our electromobility shift assay studies suggest that the acetylation of Pab1-K131 negatively impacts poly(A) RNA binding. Due to the conserved nature of stress granules, therapeutics targeting the activity of lysine acetyltransferases and lysine deacetylase enzymes may be a promising route to modulate stress granule dynamics in the disease state.