BIOE 402. Medical Technology Assessment. 2 or 3 hours. Bioentrepreneur course. Assessment of medical technology in the context of commercialization. Objectives, competition, market share, funding, pricing, manufacturing, growth, and intellectual property; many issues unique to biomedical products. Course Information: 2 undergraduate hours. 3 graduate hours. Prerequisite(s): Junior standing or above and consent of the instructor.

“Bioinformatics” 특집을 내면서

Abiotic stresses (such as metals/metalloids, salinity, ozone, UV-B radiation, extreme temperatures and drought) are among the most challenging threats to agricultural system and economic yield of crop plants. These stresses (in isolation and/or combination) induce numerous adverse effects in plants, impair biochemical/physiological and molecular processes, and eventually cause severe reductions in plant growth, development and overall productivity. Phytohormones have been recognized as a strong tool for sustainably alleviating adverse effects of abiotic stresses in crop plants. The significance of salicylic acid (SA) has been increasingly recognized in improved plant abiotic stress-tolerance via SA-mediated control of major plant-metabolic processes. However, the basic biochemical/physiological and molecular mechanisms that potentially underpin SA-induced plant-tolerance to major abiotic stresses remain least discussed. Based on recent reports, this paper: (a) overviews historical background and biosynthesis of SA under both optimal and stressful environments in plants; (b) critically appraises the role of SA in plants exposed to major abiotic stresses; (c) cross-talks potential mechanisms those are expected to govern SA-induced plant abiotic stress-tolerance; and finally (d) briefly highlights major aspects so far unexplored in the current context.

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Salicylic acid-induced abiotic stress tolerance and underlying mechanisms in plants

Abiotic stresses including drought, salinity, heat, cold, flooding, and ultraviolet radiation causes crop losses worldwide. In recent times, preventing these crop losses and producing more food and feed to meet the demands of ever-increasing human populations have gained unprecedented importance. However, the proportion of agricultural lands facing multiple abiotic stresses is expected only to rise under a changing global climate fueled by anthropogenic activities. Identifying the mechanisms developed and deployed by plants to counteract abiotic stresses and maintain their growth and survival under harsh conditions thus holds great significance. Recent investigations have shown that phytohormones, including the classical auxins, cytokinins, ethylene, and gibberellins, and newer members including brassinosteroids, jasmonates, and strigolactones may prove to be important metabolic engineering targets for producing abiotic stress-tolerant crop plants. In this review, we summarize and critically assess the roles that phytohormones play in plant growth and development and abiotic stress tolerance, besides their engineering for conferring abiotic stress tolerance in transgenic crops. We also describe recent successes in identifying the roles of phytohormones under stressful conditions. We conclude by describing the recent progress and future prospects including limitations and challenges of phytohormone engineering for inducing abiotic stress tolerance in crop plants.

Phytohormones and their metabolic engineering for abiotic stress tolerance in crop plants

Plants are sessile beings, so the need of mechanisms to flee from unfavorable circumstances has provided the development of unique and sophisticated responses to environmental stresses. Depending on the degree of plasticity, many morphological, cellular, anatomical, and physiological changes occur in plants in response to abiotic stress. Phytohormones are small molecules that play critical roles in regulating plant growth and development, as well as stress tolerance to promote survival and acclimatize to varying environments. To congregate the challenges of salinity, temperature extremes, and osmotic stress, plants use their genetic mechanism and different adaptive and biological approaches for survival and high production. In the present attempt, we review the potential role of different phytohormones and plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria in abiotic stresses and summarize the research progress in plant responses to abiotic stresses at physiological and molecular levels. We emphasized the regulatory circuits of abscisic acid, indole acetic acid, cytokinins, gibberellic acid, salicylic acid, brassinosteroids, jasmonates, ethylene, and triazole on exposure to abiotic stresses. Current progress is exemplified by the identification and validation of several significant genes that enhanced crop tolerance to stress in the field. These findings will make the modification of hormone biosynthetic pathways for the transgenic plant generation with augmented abiotic stress tolerance and boosting crop productivity in the coming decades possible.

Potential role of phytohormones and plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria in abiotic stresses: consequences for changing environment.

Fungi are an understudied, biotechnologically valuable group of organisms. Due to 
the immense range of habitats that fungi inhabit, and the consequent need to compete against a diverse array of other fungi, bacteria, and animals, fungi have developed numerous survival mechanisms. The unique attributes of fungi thus herald great promise for their application in biotechnology and industry. Moreover, fungi can be grown with relative ease, making production at scale viable. The search for fungal biodiversity, and the construction of a living fungi collection, both have incredible economic potential in locating organisms with novel industrial uses that will lead to novel products. This manuscript reviews fifty ways in which fungi can potentially be utilized as biotechnology. We provide notes and examples for each potential exploitation and give examples from our own work and the work of other notable researchers. We also provide a flow chart that can be used to convince funding bodies of the importance of fungi for biotechnological research and as potential products. Fungi have provided the world with penicillin, lovastatin, and other globally significant medicines, and they remain an untapped resource with enormous industrial potential.

The amazing potential of fungi: 50 ways we can exploit fungi industrially

Recent achievements in plant microRNA (miRNA), a large class of small and non-coding RNAs, are very exciting. A wide array of techniques involving forward genetic, molecular cloning, bioinformatic analysis, and the latest technology, deep sequencing have greatly advanced miRNA discovery. A tiny miRNA sequence has the ability to target single/multiple mRNA targets. Most of the miRNA targets are transcription factors (TFs) which have paramount importance in regulating the plant growth and development. Various families of TFs, which have regulated a range of regulatory networks, may assist plants to grow under normal and stress environmental conditions. This present review focuses on the regulatory relationships between miRNAs and different families of TFs like; NF-Y, MYB, AP2, TCP, WRKY, NAC, GRF and SPL. For instance NF-Y play important role during drought tolerance and flower development, MYB are involved in signal transduction and biosynthesis of secondary metabolites, AP2 regulate the floral development and nodule formation, TCP direct leaf development and growth hormones signalling. WRKY have known roles in multiple stress tolerances, NAC regulate lateral root formation, GRF are involved in root growth, flower, and seed development, and SPL regulate plant transition from juvenile to adult. We also studied the relation between miRNAs and TFs by consolidating the research findings from different plant species which will help plant scientists in understanding the mechanism of action and interaction between these regulators in the plant growth and development under normal and stress environmental conditions.

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MicroRNA and Transcription Factor: Key Players in Plant Regulatory Network.

Summary
Plants have evolved numerous constitutive and inducible defence mechanisms to cope with biotic and abiotic stresses. These stresses induce the expression of various genes to activate defence-related pathways that result in the release of defence chemicals. One of these defence mechanisms is the oxylipin pathway, which produces jasmonates, divinylethers and green leaf volatiles (GLVs) through the peroxidation of polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs). GLVs have recently emerged as key players in plant defence, plant–plant interactions and plant–insect interactions. Some GLVs inhibit the growth and propagation of plant pathogens, including bacteria, viruses and fungi. In certain cases, GLVs released from plants under herbivore attack can serve as aerial messengers to neighbouring plants and to attract parasitic or parasitoid enemies of the herbivores. The plants that perceive these volatile signals are primed and can then adapt in preparation for the upcoming challenges. Due to their ‘green note’ odour, GLVs impart aromas and flavours to many natural foods, such as vegetables and fruits, and therefore, they can be exploited in industrial biotechnology. The aim of this study was to review the progress and recent developments in research on the oxylipin pathway, with a specific focus on the biosynthesis and biological functions of GLVs and their applications in industrial biotechnology.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/pbi.12368

Green leaf volatiles: biosynthesis, biological functions and their applications in biotechnology

Agarwood is a resinous part of the non-timber Aquilaria tree, which is a highly valuable product for medicine and fragrance purposes. To protect the endangered Aquilaria species, mass plantation of Aquilaria trees has become a sustainable way in Asian countries to obtain the highly valuable agarwood. As only physiologically triggered Aquilaria tree can produce agarwood, effective induction methods are long sought in the agarwood industry. In this paper, we attempt to provide an overview for the past efforts toward the understanding of agarwood formation, the evolvement of induction methods and their further development prospects by integrating it with high-throughput omics approaches.

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Agarwood Induction: Current Developments and Future Perspectives.

Mitragyna speciosa is rich in secondary metabolites which are similar in effects as opium. Treatment with plant growth regulator such as salicylic acid (SA) is able to increase plant defense mechanism which later induces the expression of genes that encode secondary metabolite production. To identify genes that respond to elicitation of high concentration of SA, suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH) library was constructed using mRNA from SA-treated leaves and mRNA from non-SA-treated leaves. A total of 292 EST clones were randomly sequenced and all cleaned clone sequences (111) were analyzed using BLASTX against nonredundant NCBI databases. Results showed that most genes responding to acute SA treatment are related to stress and signaling pathways which eventually led to cell death. This include genes encoding chaperone, heatshock proteins (HSPs), antioxidants and genes involved in secondary metabolite biosynthesis, such as sinapyl alcohol dehydrogenase (SAD), cinnamyl alcohol dehydrogenase (CAD) and Cytochrome P450 (CYP 450). Further analysis was carried out using 8 out of 60 differentially expressed unique sequences through semi-quantitative RT-PCR on samples before and after treatment with 5 mM SA in 4 consecutive days. The result revealed that their expression changed over time when the plant was treated with 5 mM SA.

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Genes induced by high concentration of salicylic acid in Mitragyna speciosa

The SCF complex is a widely studied multi-subunit ring E3 ubiquitin ligase that tags targeted proteins with ubiquitin for protein degradation by the ubiquitin 26S-proteasome system (UPS). The UPS is an important system that generally keeps cellular events tightly regulated by purging misfolded or damaged proteins and selectively degrading important regulatory proteins. The specificity of this post-translational regulation is controlled by F-box proteins (FBPs) via selective recognition of a protein–protein interaction motif at the C-terminal domain. Hence, FBPs are pivotal proteins in determining the plant response in multiple scenarios. It is not surprising that the FBP family is one of the largest protein families in the plant kingdom. In this review, the roles of FBPs, specifically in plants, are compiled to provide insights into their involvement in secondary metabolites, plant stresses, phytohormone signalling, plant developmental processes and miRNA biogenesis.

Zamri Zainal

Papers

MicroRNA and Transcription Factor: Key Players in Plant Regulatory Network.

Green leaf volatiles: biosynthesis, biological functions and their applications in biotechnology

Agarwood Induction: Current Developments and Future Perspectives.

Genes induced by high concentration of salicylic acid in Mitragyna speciosa

Diverse and dynamic roles of F-box proteins in plant biology.