The taste of ribonucleosides: The molecular and cellular basis underlying chemosensory detection of previously unknown macronutrients

核糖核苷的味道：化学感应检测先前未知的大量营养素的分子和细胞基础

• 批准号: 10403449
• 负责人: Hubert O Amrein
• 金额: $ 37.67万
• 依托单位: TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY HEALTH SCIENCE CTR
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2020-06-10 至 2025-05-31
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10403449
• 关键词: Adult; Agriculture; Animals; Arthropods; Behavior; Behavioral; Biology; Biomass; Carbohydrates; Cells; Characteristics; Chemicals; Chemoreceptors; Consumption; Culicidae; Dengue; Desire for food; Detection; Disease; Disease Vectors; Drosophila genus; Drosophila melanogaster; Ecosystem; Famines; Fatty acid glycerol esters; Flour; Food; Fructose; Fruit; Gene Family; Genes; Genome; Grant; Grasshoppers; Growth; Health; Hour; Human; Image; Insect Vectors; Insecta; Isoptera; Larva; Lead; Life; Ligands; Light; Macronutrients Nutrition; Malaria; Mammals; Mediating; Microbe; Modality; Molecular; Names; Neurons; Nutrient; Order Coleoptera; Pathway interactions; Persons; Pest Control; Phase; Plants; Population Control; Productivity; Property; Proteins; Public Health; RNA; Receptor Gene; Research; Research Personnel; Resources; Ribonucleosides; Ribose; Role; Sensory; Source; Structure-Activity Relationship; System; Taste Buds; Taste Perception; Temperature; Temperature Sense; Time; Treatment Cost; Vertebrates; Work; Yellow Fever; ZIKA; dietary; fitness; fly; human disease; insect disease vector; insight; interest; novel; novel strategies; rapid growth; receptor; receptor function; sensor; sugar; taste system; tool; vanilloid receptor subtype 1; vector mosquito

Insects are the most abundant class of animals, next to vertebrates. For example, the biomass of termites alone equals that of humans, the most abundant mammal. There are about 1 million named insect species and approximately another 5 million yet to be classified, compared to about 66,000 species of vertebrates. While overall beneficial to our ecosystem, some insects have considerable negative impact on human health. Disease vectors, mostly flies and mosquitoes, are major transmitter of microbes that cause devasting human diseases, including yellow fever, dengue, malaria and zika. These insect vectors kill close to a million people each year, sicken hundreds of millions more and incur billions of dollars annually in costs for treatment and lost productivity. Other insect species are agricultural pests and consume crops and fruits of cultivated plants, leading to famine in many parts of the world. In light of these facts, a better understanding of insect biology and behavior, in particular chemosensory behavior, is paramount for developing specific and effective strategies for population control of harmful pests. Drosophila melanogaster, with its array of experimental tools, is uniquely suited to uncover the basic principles underlying these behaviors. Like mammals and other insects, Drosophila depend on chemosensory systems to navigate their external world appropriately. The sense of taste is particularly important to identify food sources and avoid harmful chemicals. To assure that all essential food chemicals are consumed, insects have evolved appetitive taste receptors for the three major macronutrients, proteins, carbohydrates and fats. Intriguingly, Drosophila larvae, in contrast to adult flies, can also sense ribonucleosides and RNA in their food. These chemicals represent an essential resource required to support rapid growth and survival during the fast-growing larval stages. Larvae employ a small number of closely related taste receptors, the Gustatory Receptors (Grs) 28 to detect these chemicals. The Gr28 genes are among the most conserved insect taste receptor genes, homologs of which are found in all insect genomes, from flour beetles to honeybees to mosquitoes. These observations suggest that the Gr28 genes have a conserved role, namely to detect RNA and ribonucleosides in insects. Remarkably, some of the Gr28 genes have been implicated in temperature and light sensing, expanding their role to sensory pathways beyond taste. Thus, an in-depth understanding of the function of receptors for RNA and ribonucleosides is of considerable interest, especially because they are broadly conserved in diverse insect species, from disease vectors (mosquitoes and flies), to agricultural pests (beetles, grasshoppers) and ecologically beneficial pollinators (honeybees). Exploiting the ability of insects to sense RNA and ribonucleosides via specific taste receptors may provide new opportunities to develop strategies for control of harmful insects.

昆虫是数量最多的动物纲，仅次于脊椎动物。例如，生物量 仅白蚁就相当于数量最多的哺乳动物人类。大约有100万种已命名的昆虫 大约还有 500 万种尚未分类，相比之下，大约有 66,000 种 脊椎动物。虽然总体上对我们的生态系统有益，但有些昆虫对我们的生态系统有相当大的负面影响 人类健康。疾病媒介，主要是苍蝇和蚊子，是引起疾病的微生物的主要传播者 毁灭性的人类疾病，包括黄热病、登革热、疟疾和寨卡病毒。这些昆虫媒介杀死了附近的人 每年造成 100 万人死亡，数亿人患病，每年造成数十亿美元的损失 治疗和丧失生产力。其他昆虫种类是农业害虫，以农作物和水果为食 毁坏栽培植物，导致世界许多地区发生饥荒。考虑到这些事实，更好的 了解昆虫生物学和行为，特别是化学感应行为，对于 制定具体有效的有害生物种群控制战略。 黑腹果蝇拥有一系列实验工具，非常适合揭示基本原理 这些行为背后的原则。与哺乳动物和其他昆虫一样，果蝇也依赖于 化学感应系统可以适当地导航外部世界。味觉感觉特别好 识别食物来源并避免有害化学物质很重要。确保所有必需的食品化学品 被消耗后，昆虫已经进化出对三种主要常量营养素、蛋白质、 碳水化合物和脂肪。有趣的是，与成蝇相比，果蝇幼虫也能感知 食物中含有核糖核苷和RNA。这些化学品是支持 在快速生长的幼虫阶段快速生长和存活。幼虫采用少量紧密的 相关的味觉受体，即味觉受体 (Grs) 28 来检测这些化学物质。 Gr28 基因是 在最保守的昆虫味觉受体基因中，其同源物存在于所有昆虫基因组中， 从面粉甲虫到蜜蜂再到蚊子。这些观察结果表明 Gr28 基因具有 保守作用，即检测昆虫中的RNA和核糖核苷。值得注意的是，一些 Gr28 基因 与温度和光传感有关，将其作用扩展到感官通路之外 品尝。因此，深入了解 RNA 和核糖核苷受体的功能至关重要。 相当大的兴趣，特别是因为它们在不同的昆虫物种中广泛保存，从 疾病媒介（蚊子和苍蝇）、农业害虫（甲虫、蚱蜢）和生态 有益的传粉者（蜜蜂）。利用昆虫感知 RNA 和核糖核苷的能力 特定的味觉受体可能为制定控制有害昆虫的策略提供新的机会。