image: This is Neonothopanus gardneri growing on the base of the babassu palm tree in Brazil. view more
Credit: Image courtesy of Hans E. Waldenmaier and Cassius V. Stevani.
Researchers report the development of a fungus-derived bioluminescent reporter system for potential use in biomedical imaging and other applications. Bioluminescence, a natural process in which the enzyme luciferase oxidizes the compound luciferin to emit light, is widespread among microbes, fungi, and animals. Researchers have unraveled the biosynthetic pathway of bacterial luciferin and used engineered luciferases as molecular reporters. However, a complete pathway to synthesize luciferin and bestow bioluminescence on eukaryotes has not been engineered. Ilia Yampolsky and colleagues uncovered the set of enzymes that allows the bioluminescent fungus Neonothopanus nambi to emit light. The bioluminescent system includes a luciferase and three enzymes that enable biosynthesis of fungal luciferin from the metabolite caffeic acid. The authors report that insertion of the fungal luciferase gene along with two other genes into the yeast Pichia pastoris makes the yeast cells spontaneously emit green light. Further, the authors demonstrated that fungal luciferase can serve as a bioluminescent reporter in amphibian embryos and human cancer cells, among other cell types. According to the authors, the fungal bioluminescent system could help create spontaneously glowing plants and animals for use in biomedical imaging and landscape design, among other potential applications.
Article #18-03615: "Genetically encodable bioluminescent system from fungi," by Alexey Kotlobay et al.
MEDIA CONTACT: Ilia Yampolsky, Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia; e-mail: ivyamp@gmail.com; Karen Sarkisyan, Planta LLC, Moscow, Russia; e-mail: karen@planta.bio
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