Engineered AAV13 variants with enhanced transduction and confined spread.

Precise targeting of specific regions within the central nervous system (CNS) is crucial for both scientific research and gene therapy in the context of brain diseases. Adeno-associated virus 13 (AAV13) is known for its restricted diffusion range within the CNS, making it an ideal choice for precise labeling and administration within small brain regions. However, AAV13 mediates relatively low expression of target genes. Here, we introduced specifically engineered modifications to the AAV13 capsid protein to enhance its transduction efficiency. We first constructed AAV13-YF by mutating tyrosine to phenylalanine on the surface of the AAV13 capsid. We then inserted the 7m8 peptide, known to enhance cell transduction, into positions 587/588 and 585/586 of the AAV13 capsid, resulting in two distinct variants named AAV13-587-7m8 and AAV13-585-7m8, respectively. We found that AAV13-YF exhibited superior in vitro infectivity in HEK293T cells compared to AAV13, while AAV13-587-7m8 and AAV13-585-7m8 showed enhanced CNS infection capabilities in C57BL/6 mice, with AAV13-587-7m8 infection retaining a limited spread range. These modified AAV13 variants hold promising potential for applications in gene therapy and neuroscience research.

A rabies virus-based toolkit for efficient retrograde labeling and monosynaptic tracing.

Analyzing the structure and function of the brain's neural network is critical for identifying the working principles of the brain and the mechanisms of brain diseases. Recombinant rabies viral vectors allow for the retrograde labeling of projection neurons and cell type-specific trans-monosynaptic tracing, making these vectors powerful candidates for the dissection of synaptic inputs. Although several attenuated rabies viral vectors have been developed, their application in studies of functional networks is hindered by the long preparation cycle and low yield of these vectors. To overcome these limitations, we developed an improved production system for the rapid rescue and preparation of a high-titer CVS-N2c-ΔG virus. Our results showed that the new CVS-N2c-ΔG-based toolkit performed remarkably: (1) N2cG-coated CVS-N2c-ΔG allowed for efficient retrograde access to projection neurons that were unaddressed by rAAV9-Retro, and the efficiency was six times higher than that of rAAV9-Retro; (2) the trans-monosynaptic efficiency of oG-mediated CVS-N2c-ΔG was 2-3 times higher than that of oG-mediated SAD-B19-ΔG; (3) CVS-N2c-ΔG could delivery modified genes for neural activity monitoring, and the time window during which this was maintained was 3 weeks; and (4) CVS-N2c-ΔG could express sufficient recombinases for efficient transgene recombination. These findings demonstrate that new CVS-N2c-ΔG-based toolkit may serve as a versatile tool for structural and functional studies of neural circuits.

Molecular characterization of an Apolipophorin-III gene from the Chinese oak silkworm, Antheraea pernyi (Lepidoptera: Saturniidae).

Apolipophorin-III (ApoLp-III) acts in lipid transport, lipoprotein metabolism, and innate immunity in insects. In this study, an ApoLp-III gene of Antheraea pernyi pupae (Ap-ApoLp-III) was isolated and characterized. The full-length cDNA of Ap-ApoLp-III is 687 bp, including a 5'-untranslated region (UTR) of 40 bp, 3'-UTR of 86 bp and an open reading frame of 561 bp encoding a polypeptide of 186 amino acids that contains an Apolipophorin-III precursor domain (PF07464). The deduced Ap-apoLp-III protein sequence has 68, 59, and 23% identity with its orthologs of Manduca sexta, Bombyx mori, and Aedes aegypti, respectively. Phylogenetic analysis showed that the Ap-apoLp-III was close to that of Bombycoidea. qPCR analysis revealed that Ap-ApoLp-III expressed during the four developmental stages and in integument, fat body, and ovaries. After six types of microorganism infections, expression levels of the Ap-ApoLp-III gene were upregulated significantly at different time points compared with control. RNA interference (RNAi) of Ap-ApoLp-III showed that the expression of Ap-ApoLp-III was significantly downregulated using qPCR after injection of E. coli. We infer that the Ap-ApoLp-III gene acts in the innate immunity of A. pernyi.

Identification of immune response-related genes in the Chinese oak silkworm, Antheraea pernyi by suppression subtractive hybridization.

Insects possess an innate immune system that responds to invading microorganisms. In this study, a subtractive cDNA library was constructed to screen for immune response-related genes in the fat bodies of Antheraea pernyi (Lepidoptera: Saturniidae) pupa challenged with Escherichia coli. Four hundred putative EST clones were identified by suppression subtractive hybridization (SSH), including 50 immune response-related genes, three cytoskeleton genes, eight cell cycle and apoptosis genes, five respiration and energy metabolism genes, five transport genes, 40 metabolism genes, ten stress response genes, four transcription and translation regulation genes and 77 unknown genes. To verify the reliability of the SSH data, the transcription of a set of randomly selected immune response-related genes were confirmed by semi-quantitative reverse transcription-PCR (RT-PCR) and real-time quantitative reverse transcription-PCR (qRT-PCR). These identified immune response-related genes provide insight into understanding the innate immunity in A. pernyi.

Characterization of the complete mitochondrial genome of Diaphania pyloalis (Lepidoptera: Pyralididae).

The complete mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) of Diaphania pyloalis (Lepidoptera: Pyralididae) was determined to be 15,298 bp and has the typical gene organization of mitogenomes from lepidopteran insects. It consists of 13 protein-coding genes (PCGs), two rRNA genes, 22 tRNA genes and an A+T-rich region. The A+T content of this mitogenome is 80.83% and the AT skew is slightly positive. All PCGs are initiated by ATN codons, except for cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (cox1) gene which is initiated by CGA. Only the cox2 gene has an incomplete stop codon consisting of just a T. All the tRNA genes display a typical clover-leaf structure of mitochondrial tRNA. The A+T-rich region of the mitogenome is 332 bp in length, including several common features found in lepidopteran mitogenomes. Phylogenetic analysis showed that the D. pyloalis is close to Pyralididae.

Overexpression of small heat shock protein 21 protects the Chinese oak silkworm Antheraea pernyi against thermal stress.

Small heat shock proteins (sHSPs) usually act as molecular chaperones to prevent proteins from being denatured in extreme conditions. We first report the sHSP21 gene, named as Ap-sHSP21, in the Chinese oak silkworm Antheraea pernyi (Lepidoptera: Saturniidae). The full-length cDNA of Ap-sHSP21 is 976 bp, including a 5'-untranslated region (UTR) of 99 bp, a 3'-UTR of 316 bp and an open reading frame (ORF) of 561 bp encoding a polypeptide of 186 amino acids. The deduced A. pernyi sHSP21 protein sequence reveals the percent identity is 82-93% in comparison to other sHSPs from insects. Real-time quantitative reverse transcription-PCR (qRT-PCR) analysis shows that Ap-sHSP21 expression is higher in testis than that in other examined tissues and significantly up-regulated after heat shock. In addition, prokaryotic expression and purification of the Ap-sHSP21 protein were performed. SDS-PAGE and Western blot analysis demonstrated that a 25 kDa recombinant protein was successfully expressed in Escherichia coli cells and the purified recombinant protein was also confirmed to protect restriction enzymes from thermal inactivation. The expression of Ap-sHSP21 was significantly down-regulated after RNA interference, which was confirmed by qRT-PCR and Western blot analysis. All together, these results suggest that Ap-sHSP21 play a key role in thermal tolerance.