食线虫真菌致病相关丝氨酸蛋白酶的研究进展

Advances in pathogenicity-related serine proteases in nematophagous fungi

摘要:

食线虫真菌是一类土壤微生物，作为线虫的天敌，它们对于维持线虫在土壤生态环境中的种群动态平衡发挥着十分重要的作用。食线虫真菌通过形成特殊的捕食器官或产生毒素等方式来捕捉和杀死线虫。丝氨酸蛋白酶是食线虫真菌侵染线虫的重要毒力因子，近年来，研究人员对不同食线虫真菌来源的致病相关丝氨酸蛋白酶进行了大量的研究，尤其在丝氨酸蛋白酶的晶体结构和分子进化方面的研究取得了较大的进展。本文对食线虫真菌致病相关丝氨酸蛋白酶的生物化学性质和功能进行了系统的总结，对丝氨酸蛋白酶的晶体结构、催化机制及分子进化等最新的进展进行了评述。

Abstract:

Nematophagous fungi are an important group of soil microoganisms, which serve as natural enemies of nematodes and play important roles in maintaining nematode population dynamics in natural environments. Nematophagous fungi can attack and kill nematodes through producing specialized capturing devices, or toxins. Serine proteases are important virulence factors involved in the pathogenicity of nematophagous fungi infect against nematodes. Recently, pathogenicity-related serine proteases from different nematophagous fungi have been extensively characterized, especially, greater progress have been made in their crystal structure and molecular evolution. Here, the biochemical properties and functions of the pathogenicity-related serine proteases in nematophagous fungi were summarized, and the latest progress about their crystal structure, catalytic mechanism and molecular evolution were reviewed.