Processive dynamics of the usher assembly platform during uropathogenic Escherichia coli P pilus biogenesis.

Uropathogenic Escherichia coli assemble surface structures termed pili or fimbriae to initiate infection of the urinary tract. P pili facilitate bacterial colonization of the kidney and pyelonephritis. P pili are assembled through the conserved chaperone-usher pathway.

Handover mechanism of the growing pilus by the bacterial outer-membrane usher FimD.

Pathogenic bacteria such as Escherichia coli assemble surface structures termed pili, or fimbriae, to mediate binding to host-cell receptors. Type 1 pili are assembled via the conserved chaperone-usher pathway. The outer-membrane usher FimD recruits pilus subunits bound by the chaperone FimC via the periplasmic N-terminal domain of the usher.

Identification of novel genes in the carotenogenic and oleaginous yeast Rhodotorula toruloides through genome-wide insertional mutagenesis.

Background: Rhodotorula toruloides is an outstanding producer of lipids and carotenoids. Currently, information on the key metabolic pathways and their molecular basis of regulation remains scarce, severely limiting efforts to engineer it as an industrial host.

Results: We have adapted Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation (ATMT) as a gene-tagging tool for the identification of novel genes in R.

Construction of human Fab library and screening of a single-domain antibody of amyloid-beta 42 oligomers.

Screening humanized antibodies from a human Fab phage display library is an effective and quick method to obtain beta-amyloid oligomers. Thus, the present study prepared amyloid-beta 42 oli-gomers and constructed a naïve human Fab phage display library based on blood samples from six healthy people. After three rounds of biopanning in vitro, a human single-domain antibody that specifically recognized amyloid-beta 42 oligomers was identified.

Molecular characterization of KU70 and KU80 homologues and exploitation of a KU70-deficient mutant for improving gene deletion frequency in Rhodosporidium toruloides.

Background: Rhodosporidium toruloides is a β-carotenoid accumulating, oleaginous yeast that has great biotechnological potential. The lack of reliable and efficient genetic manipulation tools have been a major hurdle blocking its adoption as a biotechnology platform.

Results: We report for the first time the development of a highly efficient targeted gene deletion method in R.

Improved dominant selection markers and co-culturing conditions for efficient Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation of Ustilago scitaminea.

Ustilago scitaminea is the causal agent of sugar-cane smut disease. There is, however, no genetic transformation method for it. Here we report the development of an efficient mutagenesis method based on Agrobacterium tumefaciens-mediated transformation.

Characterization of glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase gene RtGPD1 and development of genetic transformation method by dominant selection in oleaginous yeast Rhodosporidium toruloides.

The oleaginous yeast Rhodosporidium toruloides, which belongs to the Pucciniomycotina subphylum in the Basidiomycota, has attracted strong interest in the biofuel community recently due to its ability to accumulate more than 60% of dry biomass as lipid under high-density fermentation. A 3,543-nucleotide (nt) DNA fragment of the glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase gene (GPD1) was isolated from R. toruloides ATCC 10657 and characterized in details.