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Publications - Molecular Signal Processing

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Publications

Nishiyama, T.; Sakayama, H.; de Vries, J.; Buschmann, H.; Saint-Marcoux, D.; Ullrich, K. K.; Haas, F. B.; Vanderstraeten, L.; Becker, D.; Lang, D.; Vosolsobě, S.; Rombauts, S.; Wilhelmsson, P. K.; Janitza, P.; Kern, R.; Heyl, A.; Rümpler, F.; Calderón Villalobos, L. I. A.; Clay, J. M.; Skokan, R.; Toyoda, A.; Suzuki, Y.; Kagoshima, H.; Schijlen, E.; Tajeshwar, N.; Catarino, B.; Hetherington, A. J.; Saltykova, A.; Bonnot, C.; Breuninger, H.; Symeonidi, A.; Radhakrishnan, G. V.; Van Nieuwerburgh, F.; Deforce, D.; Chang, C.; Karol, K. G.; Hedrich, R.; Ulvskov, P.; Glöckner, G.; Delwiche, C. F.; Petrášek, J.; Van de Peer, Y.; Friml, J.; Beilby, M.; Dolan, L.; Kohara, Y.; Sugano, S.; Fujiyama, A.; Delaux, P.-M.; Quint, M.; Theißen, G.; Hagemann, M.; Harholt, J.; Dunand, C.; Zachgo, S.; Langdale, J.; Maumus, F.; Van Der Straeten, D.; Gould, S. B.; Rensing, S. A.; The Chara Genome: Secondary Complexity and Implications for Plant Terrestrialization Cell 174, 448-464.e24, (2018) DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2018.06.033

Land plants evolved from charophytic algae, among which Charophyceae possess the most complex body plans. We present the genome of Chara braunii; comparison of the genome to those of land plants identified evolutionary novelties for plant terrestrialization and land plant heritage genes. C. braunii employs unique xylan synthases for cell wall biosynthesis, a phragmoplast (cell separation) mechanism similar to that of land plants, and many phytohormones. C. braunii plastids are controlled via land-plant-like retrograde signaling, and transcriptional regulation is more elaborate than in other algae. The morphological complexity of this organism may result from expanded gene families, with three cases of particular note: genes effecting tolerance to reactive oxygen species (ROS), LysM receptor-like kinases, and transcription factors (TFs). Transcriptomic analysis of sexual reproductive structures reveals intricate control by TFs, activity of the ROS gene network, and the ancestral use of plant-like storage and stress protection proteins in the zygote.
Preprints

Raschke, A.; Ibañez, C.; Ullrich, K. K.; Anwer, M. U.; Becker, S.; Glöckner, A.; Trenner, J.; Denk, K.; Saal, B.; Sun, X.; Ni, M.; Davis, S. J.; Delker, C.; Quint, M.; Natural Variants of ELF3 Affect Thermomorphogenesis by Transcriptionally Modulating PIF4-Dependent Auxin Response Genes bioRxiv (2015) DOI: 10.1101/015305

Perception and transduction of temperature changes result in altered growth enabling plants to adapt to increased ambient temperature. While PHYTOCHROME-INTERACTING FACTOR4 (PIF4) has been identified as a major ambient temperature signaling hub, its upstream regulation seems complex and is poorly understood. Here, we exploited natural variation for thermo-responsive growth in Arabidopsis thaliana using quantitative trait locus (QTL) analysis. We identified GIRAFFE2.1, a major QTL explaining ~18% of the phenotypic variation for temperature-induced hypocotyl elongation in the Bay-0 x Sha recombinant inbred line population. Transgenic complementation demonstrated that allelic variation in the circadian clock regulator EARLY FLOWERING3 (ELF3) is underlying this QTL. The source of variation could be allocated to a single nucleotide polymorphism in the ELF3 coding region, resulting in differential expression of PIF4 and its target genes, likely causing the observed natural variation in thermo-responsive growth. In combination with other recent studies, this work establishes the role of ELF3 in the ambient temperature signaling network. Natural variation of ELF3-mediated gating of PIF4 expression during nightly growing periods seems to be affected by a coding sequence quantitative trait nucleotide that confers a selective advantage in certain environments. In addition, natural ELF3 alleles seem to differentially integrate temperature and photoperiod cues to induce architectural changes. Thus, ELF3 emerges as an essential coordinator of growth and development in response to diverse environmental cues and implicates ELF3 as an important target of adaptation.
Publications

Raschke, A.; Ibañez, C.; Ullrich, K. K.; Anwer, M. U.; Becker, S.; Glöckner, A.; Trenner, J.; Denk, K.; Saal, B.; Sun, X.; Ni, M.; Davis, S. J.; Delker, C.; Quint, M.; Natural variants of ELF3 affect thermomorphogenesis by transcriptionally modulating PIF4-dependent auxin response genes BMC Plant Biol. 15, 197, (2015) DOI: 10.1186/s12870-015-0566-6

BackgroundPerception and transduction of temperature changes result in altered growth enabling plants to adapt to increased ambient temperature. While PHYTOCHROME-INTERACTING FACTOR4 (PIF4) has been identified as a major ambient temperature signaling hub, its upstream regulation seems complex and is poorly understood. Here, we exploited natural variation for thermo-responsive growth in Arabidopsis thaliana using quantitative trait locus (QTL) analysis.ResultsWe identified GIRAFFE2.1, a major QTL explaining ~18 % of the phenotypic variation for temperature-induced hypocotyl elongation in the Bay-0 x Sha recombinant inbred line population. Transgenic complementation demonstrated that allelic variation in the circadian clock regulator EARLY FLOWERING3 (ELF3) is underlying this QTL. The source of variation could be allocated to a single nucleotide polymorphism in the ELF3 coding region, resulting in differential expression of PIF4 and its target genes, likely causing the observed natural variation in thermo-responsive growth.ConclusionsIn combination with other recent studies, this work establishes the role of ELF3 in the ambient temperature signaling network. Natural variation of ELF3-mediated gating of PIF4 expression during nightly growing periods seems to be affected by a coding sequence quantitative trait nucleotide that confers a selective advantage in certain environments. In addition, natural ELF3 alleles seem to differentially integrate temperature and photoperiod information to induce architectural changes. Thus, ELF3 emerges as an essential coordinator of growth and development in response to diverse environmental cues and implicates ELF3 as an important target of adaptation.
Publications

Poeschl, Y.; Delker, C.; Trenner, J.; Ullrich, K. K.; Quint, M.; Grosse, I.; Optimized Probe Masking for Comparative Transcriptomics of Closely Related Species PLOS ONE 8, e78497, (2013) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0078497

Microarrays are commonly applied to study the transcriptome of specific species. However, many available microarrays are restricted to model organisms, and the design of custom microarrays for other species is often not feasible. Hence, transcriptomics approaches of non-model organisms as well as comparative transcriptomics studies among two or more species often make use of cost-intensive RNAseq studies or, alternatively, by hybridizing transcripts of a query species to a microarray of a closely related species. When analyzing these cross-species microarray expression data, differences in the transcriptome of the query species can cause problems, such as the following: (i) lower hybridization accuracy of probes due to mismatches or deletions, (ii) probes binding multiple transcripts of different genes, and (iii) probes binding transcripts of non-orthologous genes. So far, methods for (i) exist, but these neglect (ii) and (iii). Here, we propose an approach for comparative transcriptomics addressing problems (i) to (iii), which retains only transcript-specific probes binding transcripts of orthologous genes. We apply this approach to an Arabidopsis lyrata expression data set measured on a microarray designed for Arabidopsis thaliana, and compare it to two alternative approaches, a sequence-based approach and a genomic DNA hybridization-based approach. We investigate the number of retained probe sets, and we validate the resulting expression responses by qRT-PCR. We find that the proposed approach combines the benefit of sequence-based stringency and accuracy while allowing the expression analysis of much more genes than the alternative sequence-based approach. As an added benefit, the proposed approach requires probes to detect transcripts of orthologous genes only, which provides a superior base for biological interpretation of the measured expression responses.
Publications

Quint, M.; Drost, H.-G.; Gabel, A.; Ullrich, K. K.; Bönn, M.; Grosse, I.; A transcriptomic hourglass in plant embryogenesis Nature 490, 98-101, (2012) DOI: 10.1038/nature11394

Animal and plant development starts with a constituting phase called embryogenesis, which evolved independently in both lineages1. Comparative anatomy of vertebrate development—based on the Meckel-Serrès law2 and von Baer’s laws of embryology3 from the early nineteenth century—shows that embryos from various taxa appear different in early stages, converge to a similar form during mid-embryogenesis, and again diverge in later stages. This morphogenetic series is known as the embryonic ‘hourglass’4,5, and its bottleneck of high conservation in mid-embryogenesis is referred to as the phylotypic stage6. Recent analyses in zebrafish and Drosophila embryos provided convincing molecular support for the hourglass model, because during the phylotypic stage the transcriptome was dominated by ancient genes7 and global gene expression profiles were reported to be most conserved8. Although extensively explored in animals, an embryonic hourglass has not been reported in plants, which represent the second major kingdom in the tree of life that evolved embryogenesis. Here we provide phylotranscriptomic evidence for a molecular embryonic hourglass in Arabidopsis thaliana, using two complementary approaches. This is particularly significant because the possible absence of an hourglass based on morphological features in plants suggests that morphological and molecular patterns might be uncoupled. Together with the reported developmental hourglass patterns in animals, these findings indicate convergent evolution of the molecular hourglass and a conserved logic of embryogenesis across kingdoms.
Publications

Janitza, P.; Ullrich, K. K.; Quint, M.; Toward a comprehensive phylogenetic reconstruction of the evolutionary history of mitogen-activated protein kinases in the plant kingdom Front. Plant Sci. 3, 271, (2012) DOI: 10.3389/fpls.2012.00271

The mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway is a three-tier signaling cascade that transmits cellular information from the plasma membrane to the cytoplasm where it triggers downstream responses. The MAPKs represent the last step in this cascade and are activated when both tyrosine and threonine residues in a conserved TxY motif are phosphorylated by MAPK kinases, which in turn are themselves activated by phosphorylation by MAPK kinase kinases. To understand the molecular evolution of MAPKs in the plant kingdom, we systematically conducted a Hidden-Markov-Model based screen to identify MAPKs in 13 completely sequenced plant genomes. In this analysis, we included green algae, bryophytes, lycophytes, and several mono- and eudicotyledonous species covering >800 million years of evolution. The phylogenetic relationships of the 204 identified MAPKs based on Bayesian inference facilitated the retraction of the sequence of emergence of the four major clades that are characterized by the presence of a TDY or TEY-A/TEY-B/TEY-C type kinase activation loop. We present evidence that after the split of TDY- and TEY-type MAPKs, initially the TEY-C clade emerged. This was followed by the TEY-B clade in early land plants until the TEY-A clade finally emerged in flowering plants. In addition to these well characterized clades, we identified another highly conserved clade of 45 MAPK-likes, members of which were previously described as Mak-homologous kinases. In agreement with their essential functions, molecular population genetic analysis of MAPK genes in Arabidopsis thaliana accessions reveal that purifying selection drove the evolution of the MAPK family, implying strong functional constraints on MAPK genes. Closely related MAPKs most likely subfunctionalized, a process in which differential transcriptional regulation of duplicates may be involved.
Publications

Ludwig-Müller, J.; Denk, K.; Cohen, J. D.; Quint, M.; An Inhibitor of Tryptophan-Dependent Biosynthesis of Indole-3-Acetic Acid Alters Seedling Development in Arabidopsis J. Plant Growth Regul. 29, 242-248, (2010) DOI: 10.1007/s00344-009-9128-1

Although polar transport and the TIR1-dependent signaling pathway of the plant hormone auxin/indole-3-acetic acid (IAA) are well characterized, understanding of the biosynthetic pathway(s) leading to the production of IAA is still limited. Genetic dissection of IAA biosynthetic pathways has been complicated by the metabolic redundancy caused by the apparent existence of several parallel biosynthetic routes leading to IAA production. Valuable complementary tools for genetic as well as biochemical analysis of auxin biosynthesis would be molecular inhibitors capable of acting in vivo on specific or general components of the pathway(s), which unfortunately have been lacking. Several indole derivatives have been previously identified to inhibit tryptophan-dependent IAA biosynthesis in an in vitro system from maize endosperm. We examined the effect of one of them, 6-fluoroindole, on seedling development of Arabidopsis thaliana and tested its ability to inhibit IAA biosynthesis in feeding experiments in vivo. We demonstrated a correlation of severe developmental defects or growth retardation caused by 6-fluoroindole with significant downregulation of de novo synthesized IAA levels, derived from the stable isotope-labeled tryptophan pool, upon treatment. Hence, 6-fluoroindole shows important features of an inhibitor of tryptophan-dependent IAA biosynthesis both in vitro and in vivo and thus may find use as a promising molecular tool for the identification of novel components of the auxin biosynthetic pathway(s).
Publications

Lee, C.-W.; Efetova, M.; Engelmann, J. C.; Kramell, R.; Wasternack, C.; Ludwig-Müller, J.; Hedrich, R.; Deeken, R.; Agrobacterium tumefaciens Promotes Tumor Induction by Modulating Pathogen Defense in Arabidopsis thaliana Plant Cell 21, 2948-2962, (2009) DOI: 10.1105/tpc.108.064576

Agrobacterium tumefaciens causes crown gall disease by transferring and integrating bacterial DNA (T-DNA) into the plant genome. To examine the physiological changes and adaptations during Agrobacterium-induced tumor development, we compared the profiles of salicylic acid (SA), ethylene (ET), jasmonic acid (JA), and auxin (indole-3-acetic acid [IAA]) with changes in the Arabidopsis thaliana transcriptome. Our data indicate that host responses were much stronger toward the oncogenic strain C58 than to the disarmed strain GV3101 and that auxin acts as a key modulator of the Arabidopsis–Agrobacterium interaction. At initiation of infection, elevated levels of IAA and ET were associated with the induction of host genes involved in IAA, but not ET signaling. After T-DNA integration, SA as well as IAA and ET accumulated, but JA did not. This did not correlate with SA-controlled pathogenesis-related gene expression in the host, although high SA levels in mutant plants prevented tumor development, while low levels promoted it. Our data are consistent with a scenario in which ET and later on SA control virulence of agrobacteria, whereas ET and auxin stimulate neovascularization during tumor formation. We suggest that crosstalk among IAA, ET, and SA balances pathogen defense launched by the host and tumor growth initiated by agrobacteria.
Publications

Meixner, C.; Ludwig-Müller, J.; Miersch, O.; Gresshoff, P.; Staehelin, C.; Vierheilig, H.; Lack of mycorrhizal autoregulation and phytohormonal changes in the supernodulating soybean mutant nts1007 Planta 222, 709-715, (2005) DOI: 10.1007/s00425-005-0003-4

Autoregulatory mechanisms have been reported in the rhizobial and the mycorrhizal symbiosis. Autoregulation means that already existing nodules or an existing root colonization by an arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus systemically suppress subsequent nodule formation/root colonization in other parts of the root system. Mutants of some legumes lost their ability to autoregulate the nodule number and thus display a supernodulating phenotype. On studying the effect of pre-inoculation of one side of a split-root system with an arbuscular mycorrhizal fungus on subsequent mycorrhization in the second side of the split-root system of a wild-type soybean (Glycine max L.) cv. Bragg and its supernodulating mutant nts1007, we observed a clear suppressional effect in the wild-type, whereas further root colonization in the split-root system of the mutant nts1007 was not suppressed. These data strongly indicate that the mechanisms involved in supernodulation also affect mycorrhization and support the hypothesis that the autoregulation in the rhizobial and the mycorrhizal symbiosis is controlled in a similar manner. The accumulation patterns of the plant hormones IAA, ABA and Jasmonic acid (JA) in non-inoculated control plants and split-root systems of inoculated plants with one mycorrhizal side of the split-root system and one non-mycorrhizal side, indicate an involvement of IAA in the autoregulation of mycorrhization. Mycorrhizal colonization of soybeans also resulted in a strong induction of ABA and JA levels, but on the basis of our data the role of these two phytohormones in mycorrhizal autoregulation is questionable.
Publications

Grubb, C. D.; Zipp, B. J.; Ludwig-Müller, J.; Masuno, M. N.; Molinski, T. F.; Abel, S.; Arabidopsis glucosyltransferase UGT74B1 functions in glucosinolate biosynthesis and auxin homeostasis Plant J. 40, 893-908, (2004) DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-313X.2004.02261.x

Glucosinolates are a class of secondary metabolites with important roles in plant defense and human nutrition. Here, we characterize a putative UDP‐glucose:thiohydroximate S‐glucosyltransferase, UGT74B1, to determine its role in the Arabidopsis glucosinolate pathway. Biochemical analyses demonstrate that recombinant UGT74B1 specifically glucosylates the thiohydroximate functional group. Low K m values for phenylacetothiohydroximic acid (approximately 6 μ m ) and UDP‐glucose (approximately 50 μm ) strongly suggest that thiohydroximates are in vivo substrates of UGT74B1. Insertional loss‐of‐function ugt74b1 mutants exhibit significantly decreased, but not abolished, glucosinolate accumulation. In addition, ugt74b1 mutants display phenotypes reminiscent of auxin overproduction, such as epinastic cotyledons, elongated hypocotyls in light‐grown plants, excess adventitious rooting and incomplete leaf vascularization. Indeed, during early plant development, mutant ugt74b1 seedlings accumulate nearly threefold more indole‐3‐acetic acid than the wild type. Other phenotypes, however, such as chlorosis along the leaf veins, are likely caused by thiohydroximate toxicity. Analysis of UGT74B1 promoter activity during plant development reveals expression patterns consistent with glucosinolate metabolism and induction by auxin treatment. The results are discussed in the context of known mutations in glucosinolate pathway genes and their effects on auxin homeostasis. Taken together, our work provides complementary in vitro and in vivo evidence for a primary role of UGT74B1 in glucosinolate biosynthesis.
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