Wei Shuzhen, Wang Anan, Cai Lanlan, Ma Ruijie, Lu Longfei, Li Jiangtao, Zhang Rui
State Key Laboratory of Marine Geology, Tongji University, Shanghai, China.
Archaeal Biology Center, Synthetic Biology Research Center, Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Marine Microbiome Engineering, Key Laboratory of Marine Microbiome Engineering of Guangdong Higher Education Institutes, Institute for Advanced Study, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, China.
Environ Microbiol. 2025 Apr;27(4):e70099. doi: 10.1111/1462-2920.70099.
Marine bacteriophages, the most abundant biological entities in marine ecosystems, are essential in biogeochemical cycling. Despite extensive genomic data, many phage genes remain uncharacterised, creating a gap between genomic diversity and gene function knowledge. This gap limits our understanding of phage life cycles, assembly, and host interactions. In this study, we used mass spectrometry to profile the proteomes of 13 marine phages from diverse lifestyles and hosts. The analysis accurately annotated hypothetical genes, mapped virion protein arrangements, and revealed structural similarities among phages infecting the same host, particularly in tail fibre proteins. Protein structure comparisons showed conservation and variability in head and tail proteins, particularly in key domains involved in virion stabilisation and host recognition. For the first time, we identified post-translational modifications (PTMs) in marine phage proteins, which may enhance phage adaptability and help evade host immune systems. These findings suggest that phages optimise their infection strategies through structural variations and PTM modifications, improving their adaptability and host interactions.
海洋噬菌体是海洋生态系统中数量最多的生物实体，在生物地球化学循环中至关重要。尽管有大量的基因组数据，但许多噬菌体基因仍未得到表征，这在基因组多样性和基因功能知识之间造成了差距。这一差距限制了我们对噬菌体生命周期、组装以及与宿主相互作用的理解。在本研究中，我们使用质谱分析法对来自不同生活方式和宿主的13种海洋噬菌体的蛋白质组进行了分析。该分析准确注释了假设基因，绘制了病毒体蛋白排列图，并揭示了感染同一宿主的噬菌体之间的结构相似性，特别是在尾丝蛋白方面。蛋白质结构比较显示，头部和尾部蛋白存在保守性和变异性，尤其是在参与病毒体稳定和宿主识别的关键结构域。我们首次在海洋噬菌体蛋白中鉴定出翻译后修饰（PTM），这可能增强噬菌体的适应性并有助于逃避宿主免疫系统。这些发现表明，噬菌体通过结构变异和PTM修饰优化其感染策略，从而提高其适应性和与宿主的相互作用。
