Vijai Singh

Empirical model and in vivo characterization of the bacterial response to synthetic gene expression show that ribosome allocation limits growth rate.

Synthetic biology uses modeling to facilitate the design of new genetic constructions. In particular, it is of utmost importance to model the reaction of the cellular chassis when expressing heterologous systems. We constructed a mathematical model for the response of a bacterial cell chassis under heterologous expression. For this, we relied on previous characterization of the growth-rate dependence on cellular resource availability (in this case, DNA and RNA polymerases and ribosomes). Accordingly, we estimated the maximum capacities of the cell for heterologous expression to be 46% of the total RNA and the 33% of the total protein. To experimentally validate our model, we engineered two genetic constructions that involved the constitutive expression of a fluorescent reporter in a vector with a tunable origin of replication. We performed fluorescent measurements using population and single-cell fluorescent measurements. Our model predicted cell growth for several heterologous constructions under five different culture conditions and various plasmid copy numbers with significant accuracy, and confirmed that ribosomes act as the limiting resource. Our study also confirmed that the bacterial response to synthetic gene expression could be understood in terms of the requirement for cellular resources and could be predicted from relevant cellular parameters.

Detection of aerolysin gene in Aeromonas hydrophila isolated from fish and pond water

Aerolysin is a hemolytic toxin encoded by aerolysin gene (1482 bp) that plays a key role in the pathogenesis of Aeromonas hydrophila infection in fish. New speciesspecific primers were designed to amplify 326 bp conserved region of aerolysin gene for A. hydrophila. Twenty-five isolates of A. hydrophila recovered from fish and pond water were studied for detection of aerolysin gene. Aerolysin gene was detected in 85% of the isolates during the study. The designed primers were highly specific and showed no cross reactivity with Escherichia coli, Aeromonas veronii, Vibrio cholerae, Flavobacterium spp., Chyseobacterium spp. and Staphylococcus aureus. The sensitivity limit of primers for detection of aerolysin gene in the genomic DNA of A. hydrophila was 5 pg.

Molecular detection and cloning of thermostable hemolysin gene from Aeromonas hydrophila

Aeromonas hydrophila is a major bacterial pathogen associated with hemorrhagic septicemia in aquatic and terrestrial animals including humans. There is an urgent need to develop molecular and immunological assays for rapid, specific and sensitive diagnosis. A new set of primers has been designed for detection of thermostable hemolysin (TH) gene (645 bp) from A. hydrophila, and sensitivity limit for detection of TH gene was 5 pg. The TH gene was cloned, sequenced and analyzed. The G+C content was 68.06%; and phylogeny was constructed using TH protein sequences which had significant homology with those for thermostable and other hemolysins present in several bacterial pathogens. In addition, we have predicted the four and eight T-cell epitopes for MHC class I and II alleles, respectively. These results provide new insight for TH protein containing antigenic epitopes that can be used in immunoassays and also designing of thermostable vaccines.

Codon optimization of the major antigen encoding genes of diverse strains of influenza a virus

A large number of influenza A virus outbreaks and mortality occurred in the world recently, an urgent attention to develop effective and sufficient quantity of vaccines are needed. Vaccines are generally protein with immunogenic properties and are not expressed in sufficient quantity because of the codon bias, so it is necessary to optimize its codon in the expression host. Codon optimization was used to improve the protein expression in living organisms by increasing the translational efficiency of gene of interest. Two surface antigenic glycoproteins, hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) are present in influenza A viruses. We have used HA and NA genes from 19 strains of influenza A viruses for codon optimization in E. coli. Both genes of the influenza virus show that the codon adaptation index (CAI) and GC content of the genes in optimized DNA were enhanced significantly (p <0.01) as compared to wild type. CAI and GC of HA in optimized DNA was enhanced by 3.2 (68.5%) and 1.2 (16.2%) fold respectively, while in NA it was increased by 3.3 (69.7%) and 1.2 (15.8%) fold respectively. Our finding demonstrates that the optimized genes could be useful for better expression in host without any truncated proteins and also helpful for protein folding and function. This work provides new insight in the synthetic biology research.

Genotyping of Aeromonas hydrophila by Box elements

PCR-based DNA fingerprinting techniques were evaluated to genotype eight diseased, particularly normal and environmental isolates of Aeromonas hydrophila. PCR-based fingerprinting method has an advantage of having repetitive sequence also called Box elements that are interspersed throughout the genome in diverse bacterial species. The BOX-PCR fingerprinting technique was evaluated for the discrimination of different isolates of A. hydrophila. All the studied isolates have shown major banding patterns ranged from 500–3000 bp. These finding could be advantageous to investigate the strain level specific fingerprints of A. hydrophila as potential genotypic markers.

Homology modeling of adenosine A2A receptor and molecular docking for exploration of appropriate potent antagonists for treatment of Parkinson's disease.

Parkinsons disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder of central nervous system (CNS) that impaired the patient motor skills, speech and other functions. Adenosine A2A receptors have a unique cellular distribution in the neuron, which is used as a potential target for PD. Homology modeling was used to construct the 3-D structure of A2A using the known template (PDB: 2VT4), and the stereochemical quality was validated. Several effective antagonist drugs were selected and active amino acid residues in A2A were targeted on the basis of robust binding affinity between protein-drug interactions in molecular docking. Six antagonists, Bromocriptine, Cabergoline, Etilevodopa, Lysuride, Melevodopa and Pramipexole, were found more potent for binding and the active amino acids residues were identified (http://www.rcsb.org/pdb/) in A2A receptor. It could be used as the basis for rationale designing of novel antagonist drugs against Parkinsons disease.

Analysis of the multicopper oxidase gene regulatory network of Aeromonas hydrophila

Multicopper oxidase (MCO) is an enzyme which involves in reducing the oxygen in a four electron reduction to water with concomitant one electron oxidation of reducing the substrate. We have generated the 3-D structure of MCO by homology modeling and validated on the basis of free energy while 90.4xa0% amino acid residues present in allowed regions of Ramachandran plot. The screening of potential hazardous aromatic compounds for MCO was performed using molecular docking. We obtained Sulfonaphthal, Thymolphthalein, Bromocresol green and Phloretin derivatives of phenol and aromatic hydrocarbon were efficient substrates for MCO. The phylogeny of MCO reveals that other bacteria restrain the homologous gene of MCO may play an important role in biodegradation of aromatic compounds. We have demonstrated the gene regulatory network of MCO with other cellular proteins which play a key role in gene regulation. These findings provide a new insight for oxidization of phenolic and aromatic compounds using biodegradation process for controlling environmental pollution.

Gene network analysis of Aeromonas hydrophila for novel drug target discovery.

Increasing the multi-drug resistance Aeromonas hydrophila creates a health problem regularly thus, an urgent needs to develop and screen potent antibiotics for controlling of the infections. There are many studies have focused on interactions between specific drugs, little is known about the system properties of a full drug interaction in gene network. Thus, an attractive approach for developing novel antibiotics against DNA gyrase, an enzyme essential for DNA replication, transcription, repair and recombination mechanisms which is important for bacterial growth and cell division. Homology modeling method was used to generate the 3-D structure of B subunit of DNA gyrase (gyrB) using known crystal structure. The active amino acids in 3-D structure of gyrB were targeted for structure based virtual screening of potent drugs by molecular docking. Number of drugs and analogs were selected and used for docking against gryB. The drugs Cinodine I, Cyclothialidine and Novobiocin were found to be more binding affinity with gyrB-drug interaction. The homology of gyrB protein sequence of A. hydrophila resembles with other species of Aeromonas closely showed relationship in phylogenetic tree. We have also demonstrated the gene network interactions of gyrB with other cellular proteins which are playing the key role in gene regulation. These findings provide new insight to understand the 3-D structure of gyrB which can be used in structure-based drug discovery; and development of novel, potent and specific drug against B subunit of DNA gyrase.

Targeting the Peptide Deformylase of Mycobacterium tuberculosis Leads to Drug Discovery

Abstract: Peptide deformylase (PDF) is a ubiquitous bacterial metalloenzyme responsible to cleave the formyl group from nascent polypeptides, supporting in the maturation. It plays a vital role in the survival of bacterial cells which is con-served in the eubacteria and is considered to be an attractive target for developing new antibacterial agents. Homology modeling was employed for generation of 3-D structure of PDF of M. tuberculosis H37Rv and showed 92.5% amino acid in the allowed region of Ramachandran plot. PDF was used as target for a set of inhibitors with substantial structural dif-ferences. Docking results show that the BB-3497, BBS-54, Actinonin and BBS-02 bind with high affinity to enzyme ac-tive site. Phylogeny of PDF in M. tuberculosis H37Rv shows homology with other strains of pathogenic bacteria. These data validate PDF as a novel target for the design of a new generation of antimycobacterial agents. Keywords: Mycobacterium tuberculosis, Peptide deformylase, Docking, Phylogeny, Drugs.

Identification and analysis of putative promoter motifs in Flavivirus genome

The genus Flavivirus comprises medically significant pathogenic virus; causing several infections in humans worldwide. Flavivirus genomes are 10-11 kb approximately and encode both structural and non structural region. The non structural region plays fundamental role in the stability, regulation and cell cycle of virus. The complete genomes of 26 Flavivirus were used for identification of promoter motifs through in silico approaches. The promoter sequences were encoded in merely 16 viruses and 10 viruses could not encode it. All these in silico identified promoter motifs was confirmed and verified with the known experimental data. This analysis suggests that presence of promoter may play a crucial role in the pattern of gene expression, regulation networks, cell specificity and development. It may also be useful for designing efficient expression vector and target specific delivery system in the gene therapy.