FungEye · Characterization of the architecture, composition and evolution of a novel light perception organelle in an emerging model fungus.
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2021-09-07 → 2023-09-06
- EU contribution
- €212,934
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.
Results in brief
Characterization of the architecture, composition and evolution of a novel light perception organelle in an emerging model fungus.
Light perception is one of the most important sources of information for life on Earth. In animals, a diverse range of sophisticated light-sensing organs (e.g., eyes) have evolved. However, animals are not the only organisms to evolve such structures, with sub-cellular analogues found in several eukaryotic microbes. In Fungi, species from most major lineages have been shown to use light as a source of information using a diversity of photo-responsive proteins (photoreceptors) conserved across multiple groups and responding to important processes. These photoreceptors are not localized to an eyespot-like organelle, with one key exception. A light sensing eyespot composed of lipid-filled organelles has been described in the early diverging zoosporic fungus Blastocladiella emersonii (Be). This structure is called the ‘CyclOp-organelle’, due to its association with the ‘CyclOp’ protein. The CyclOp-organelle is an ‘eye-like’ organelle closely associated to the flagellum, although the precise cellular-architecture of this system is unknown. The CyclOp protein controls phototaxis behaviour of Be zoospores by generating a biochemical response from the function of a type 1 rhodopsin, which forms part of a unique gene-fusion protein with a guanylyl cyclase enzyme domain. Recently, the CyclOp protein of Be has been identified as a tool for optogenetic control, providing a means to control localized action potentials via a tuneable light signal. Optogenetics has important implications for society, for example, using light signalling to control individual neurons (precisely and rapidly) within a brain a useful application for deciphering the neural circuitries underlying behaviour and/or disease outcomes. There are still many questions surrounding how the CyclOp system functions in its native fungal cell, specifically what is the architecture and evolutionary origin of this sub-cellular system? The overall aim of the FungEye project is to characterize the cellular structure, proteome and evolutionary ancestry of the CyclOp-organelle. Such information is vital for understanding how this system evolved and for further optogenetic/synthetic cell biological utilization. The three main objectives of the proposed project are: 1) Use microscopy to understand the architecture and relationship between the rhodopsin surface, lipid droplets, flagellum root, and mitochondrion of the CyclOp-system. 2) Explore the proteome network associated with the CyclOp protein and the wider organelle. 3) Identify evolutionary origins of the CyclOp-organelle protein-network.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
Light perception is one of the most important sources of information for life on Earth. Its importance is such, that several microbial eukaryotic lineages independently evolved analogous sub-cellular ‘eye-structures’ to achieve a similar function. In the microbial lineages we see a similar ‘recipe’ for these systems; a light occluding or refractory surface positioned next to an action potential-generating opsin rich membrane layer. These systems represent one of the most spectacular cases of multiple convergent evolution of a cellular system.Recently, one such eye-organelle structures was described in the early-diverging zoosporic fungi Blastocladiella emersonii (Be). This putative organelle relies on a unique fusion protein (CyclOp), of a rhodopsin domain and a guanylyl cyclase domain to perceive light. Due to the capability of the CyclOp protein to control the intracellular cGMP levels of the cell, it has been intensely studied as an optogenetic tool for signalling-dependent studies. These results highlight the importance of discovery science in non-standard model microbes. However, we still do not know which cellular and molecular elements compose the wider CyclOps-system and how they interact with each other. What is more, the evolutionary history and origin of the organellar protein network remains unknown. The FungEye project aims to characterize the cellular structure, proteome and evolutionary ancestry of this novel light perception organelle. For this we will reconstruct the complete 3D cell architecture of Be zoospores to understand this cellular structure and characterize the wider protein network of the CyclOps-system. Once characterized, we will be able to reconstruct the CyclOps-organelle evolutionary history through its proteome by phylogenomics. Such progress will not only allow us to study how light perception evolved in fungi but also to identify functions useful for building synthetic light perceiving cellular systems.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD · OxfordCoordinatorUnited Kingdom
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union