Comprehensive analysis of the roles of membrane phospholipids in filamentous fungi and a dimorphic yeast.

Research Project

Project/Area Number	18H02119
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Section	一般
Review Section	Basic Section 38020:Applied microbiology-related
Research Institution	The University of Tokyo
Principal Investigator	Horiuchi Hiroyuki 東京大学, 大学院農学生命科学研究科(農学部), 教授 (00209280)
Project Period (FY)	2018-04-01 – 2021-03-31
Project Status	Completed (Fiscal Year 2020)
Budget Amount *help	¥17,550,000 (Direct Cost: ¥13,500,000、Indirect Cost: ¥4,050,000) Fiscal Year 2020: ¥5,070,000 (Direct Cost: ¥3,900,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,170,000) Fiscal Year 2019: ¥4,680,000 (Direct Cost: ¥3,600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,080,000) Fiscal Year 2018: ¥7,800,000 (Direct Cost: ¥6,000,000、Indirect Cost: ¥1,800,000)
Keywords	糸状菌 / 二形性酵母 / リン脂質 / 菌糸生長 / 形態形成
Outline of Final Research Achievements	Many studies on the physiological functions of membrane phospholipids have been performed using a unicellular yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae so far. However, their functions in dimorphic yeasts and filamentous fungi remain to be elucidated. In this study, we constructed and characterized deletion or conditional mutants of phospholipid-related genes of filamentous fungi and a dimorphic yeast. The results obtained in this study showed that their functions of the dimorphic yeast were relatively similar to those in S. cerevisiae. In contrast, the functions of these genes in the growth of filamentous fungi were more critical than those of S. cerevisiae. We also showed that these gene products played crucial roles in various processes, such as hyphal tip growth, conidiophore formation, and conidiation of the filamentous fungi.
Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements	菌類の膜リン脂質の機能に関する研究はこれまでほとんどが酵母Saccharomyces cerevisiaeを対象として行われてきたのに対し、本研究では、膜リン脂質合成、輸送などに関わる遺伝子に注目し、二形性酵母、糸状菌を用いてその遺伝子破壊株、条件変異株を作製して解析することにより、膜リン脂質の菌糸生長、胞子形成などの形態分化などにおける役割をある程度解明できたことは基礎的な側面から重要な知見である。また本研究で作製した株を利用して今後さらなる解析を行えば、応用的な側面においても産業上有用な知見が得られるとともに産業上有用な菌株の分子レベルでのさらなる育種に貢献できると考えられる。