Department of Pharmacology and Pharmaceutical Sciences, John Stauffer Pharmaceutical Sciences Center, School of Pharmacy, University of Southern California, 1985 Zonal Avenue, Los Angeles, CA, 90089, USA.
J Ind Microbiol Biotechnol. 2014 Feb;41(2):433-42. doi: 10.1007/s10295-013-1386-z. Epub 2013 Dec 17.
Fungi are prolific producers of secondary metabolites (SMs) that show a variety of biological activities. Recent advances in genome sequencing have shown that fungal genomes harbor far more SM gene clusters than are expressed under conventional laboratory conditions. Activation of these "silent" gene clusters is a major challenge, and many approaches have been taken to attempt to activate them and, thus, unlock the vast treasure chest of fungal SMs. This review will cover recent advances in genome mining of SMs in Aspergillus nidulans. We will also discuss current updates in gene annotation of A. nidulans and recent developments in A. nidulans as a molecular genetic system, both of which are essential for rapid and efficient experimental verification of SM gene clusters on a genome-wide scale. Finally, we will describe advances in the use of A. nidulans as a heterologous expression system to aid in the analysis of SM gene clusters from other fungal species that do not have an established molecular genetic system.
真菌是次生代谢产物（SMs）的丰富生产者，具有多种生物活性。最近的基因组测序进展表明，真菌基因组中蕴藏的次级代谢产物基因簇远远超过了在传统实验室条件下表达的数量。这些“沉默”基因簇的激活是一个主要挑战，人们已经采取了许多方法来试图激活它们，从而打开真菌 SMs 的巨大宝库。这篇综述将涵盖 Aspergillus nidulans 中 SMs 的基因组挖掘的最新进展。我们还将讨论 A. nidulans 的基因注释的最新更新以及 A. nidulans 作为分子遗传系统的最新发展，这些都是在全基因组范围内快速有效地对次级代谢产物基因簇进行实验验证所必需的。最后，我们将描述利用 A. nidulans 作为异源表达系统的进展，以帮助分析没有建立分子遗传系统的其他真菌物种的次级代谢产物基因簇。
