Collaborative Research - Role of Pulsatile Ca^2+ in Controlling Polarized Hyphal Tip Growth

合作研究 - 脉动 Ca^2 在控制极化菌丝尖端生长中的作用

• 批准号: 1051667
• 负责人: Seogchan Kang
• 金额: $ 23.45万
• 依托单位: Pennsylvania State Univ University Park
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Continuing Grant
• 财政年份: 2011
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2011-06-01 至 2014-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1051667&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Role; Pulsatile; Ca

Intellectual merit. All organisms have sophisticated ways for recognizing and adapting to their environment so they can survive or avoid harsh conditions, exploit new food sources or even cause disease. Several recent advances in methods for sequencing, decoding and modifying DNA and technological improvements in powerful microscopes when used in a unified approach now enable subtle abnormal effects of targeted genetic changes to be monitored inside living cells. This research uses fungi as a model system for determining how cells are able to sense changes in their microscopic environment and recruit highly specialized proteins that bind to calcium ions in a subsequent cascade of events that change the cells behavior. Genetic methods will be used to comprehensively disrupt all known key calcium interacting proteins in a fungal model organism and attach special tags that allow monitoring of calcium changes and/or movement of multiple calcium interacting and related proteins to be tracked inside of living cells. This approach will result in a comprehensive understanding of which targeted proteins allow cells to grow in a rapid and directed fashion. The scientific impacts of this project go beyond better understanding the biology of calcium signaling in the model fungus Fusarium graminearum which causes a serious disease in wheat. It will create a novel toolbox for studying the evolution of calcium signaling, a highly conserved ancient molecular language used by in virtually all organisms for converting external environmental signals into needed cellular changes. The project brings together a group of scientists with complementary backgrounds including; biochemistry, cell biology, cytology, evolutionary biology, fungal biology, informatics, math, and genetics.Broader impacts. The broad and interdisciplinary scope of this project will provide an ideal environment for practicing team-based integrative problem solving with undergraduate, graduate, and postdoctoral students. Faced with the rapidly growing complexity of biological questions, the need for such education continues to increase. A postdoc supported by this project will be mentored to develop her own program in the near future through established mentoring programs. Through hands-on week long workshops and comprehensive publicly available websites, others will have access to all resources and trained to implement the developed tools. The calcium signaling discoveries and microscopy techniques developed here will be introduced in graduate level courses and web-based tools. Undergraduate students (including minority students) will be involved in this project through NSF REU and EPSCoR programs as well as other existing credit and outreach programs at both Penn State and University of Delaware. These efforts will help the participating students gain broad perspectives and new technologies to carry forth into academic and industrial settings. This fungus model will reveal shared components of calcium signaling pathways in other similar growth forms (i.e. neurons, budding and fission yeast, epithelial cells, root hairs, pollen tubes) in animals and plants, and also expose unique attributes potentially relating to their evolutionary adaptation and functional diversity. Unique aspects of fungal Ca2+ signaling may be exploited for controlling disease.

智力优点。 所有生物体都具有识别和适应其环境的精致方法，因此它们可以生存或避免恶劣的条件，利用新食物来源甚至引起疾病。当在统一方法中使用时，在测序，解码和修饰DNA的测序，解码和修饰DNA的方法以及技术改进方面取得了一些进步，现在可以监测活细胞内的靶向遗传变化的微妙异常效应。该研究使用真菌作为模型系统，用于确定细胞如何在其微观环境中感知变化，并募集高度专业的蛋白质，这些蛋白质在随后改变细胞行为的事件的级联中与钙离子结合。遗传方法将用于全面破坏真菌模型生物体中所有已知的关键钙相互作用蛋白，并附上特殊标签，以监测钙变化和/或在活细胞内部跟踪多个钙相互作用和相关蛋白的运动。这种方法将使人们对哪种靶向蛋白质的全面了解使细胞可以快速而有方向的方式生长。该项目的科学影响超出了更好地理解模型真菌fusarium graminearum中钙信号传导的生物学，从而导致小麦的严重疾病。它将创建一个新型的工具箱，用于研究钙信号的演变，这是一种在几乎所有生物体中用于将外部环境信号转化为所需的细胞变化的高度保守的古代分子语言。该项目汇集了一群具有互补背景的科学家，包括：生物化学，细胞生物学，细胞学，进化生物学，真菌生物学，信息学，数学和遗传学。 该项目的广泛而跨学科的范围将为实践基于团队的综合问题解决本科生，研究生和博士后学生提供理想的环境。面对生物学问题的迅速复杂性，对这种教育的需求不断增加。该项目支持的博士后将通过既定的指导计划在不久的将来制定自己的计划。通过实践一周的研讨会和全面的公开网站，其他人将可以访问所有资源并接受培训以实施开发的工具。此处开发的钙信号发现和显微镜技术将在研究生级课程和基于Web的工具中引入。本科生（包括少数族裔学生）将通过NSF REU和EPSCOR计划以及宾夕法尼亚州立大学和特拉华大学的其他现有信贷和外展计划参与该项目。这些努力将帮助参与的学生获得广泛的观点和新技术，以进入学术和工业环境。该真菌模型将揭示动物和植物中其他相似生长形式（即神经元，萌芽和裂变酵母，上皮细胞，根毛，花粉管）的钙信号通路的共享组成部分，也暴露了与其进化适应和功能多样性有关的独特属性。真菌Ca2+信号传导的独特方面可能被利用用于控制疾病。