Positional cloning of a Bombyx pink-eyed white egg locus reveals the major role of cardinal in ommochrome synthesis.

Ommochromes are major insect pigments involved in coloration of compound eyes, eggs, epidermis and wings. In the silkworm Bombyx mori, adult compound eyes and eggs contain a mixture of the ommochrome pigments such as ommin and xanthommatin. Here, we identified the gene involved in ommochrome biosynthesis by positional cloning of B. mori egg and eye color mutant pink-eyed white egg (pe). The recessive homozygote of pe has bright red eyes and white or pale pink eggs instead of a normal dark coloration due to the decrease of dark ommochrome pigments. By genetic linkage analysis, we narrowed down the pe-linked region to ~258 kb, containing 17 predicted genes. RNA sequencing analyses showed that the expression of one candidate gene, the ortholog of Drosophila haem peroxidase cardinal, coincided with egg pigmentation timing, similar to other ommochrome-related genes such as Bm-scarlet and Bm-re. In two pe strains, a common missense mutation was found within a conserved motif of B. mori cardinal homolog (Bm-cardinal). RNA interference-mediated knockdown and transcription activator-like effector nuclease (TALEN)-mediated knockout of the Bm-cardinal gene produced the same phenotype as pe in terms of egg, adult eye and larval epidermis coloration. A complementation test of the pe mutant with the TALEN-mediated Bm-cardinal-deficient strain showed that the mutant phenotype could not be rescued, indicating that Bm-cardinal is responsible for pe. Moreover, knockdown of the cardinal homolog in Tribolium castaneum also induced red compound eyes. Our results indicate that cardinal plays a major role in ommochrome synthesis of holometabolous insects.

MBD2-MBD3 complex binds to hemi-methylated DNA and forms a complex containing DNMT1 at the replication foci in late S phase.

BACKGROUND: In vertebrates and plants, DNA methylation is one of the major mechanisms regulating gene expression. Recently, a family of methyl-CpG-binding proteins has been identified, and some members, such as MeCP2 and MBD2, were shown to mediate gene repression by recruiting histone deacetylase complexes to methylated genes. However, the function of another member of this family, MBD3, remained elusive. RESULTS: It was shown that MBD2 and MBD3 form homo- and hetero-dimers (or multimers) in vitro and in vivo. Significantly, the MBD2-MBD3 complex showed an affinity to hemi-methylated DNAs, a property that has never been reported with any member of the family proteins. MBD2 and MBD3 were co-localized with DNMT1 at replication foci in 293 cell nuclei at late S phase. Moreover, by a co-immunoprecipitation experiment, DNMT1 was shown to form a complex with MBD2 and MBD3. Finally, the abundance of MBD3 was highest in the late S phase when the DNMT1 is also most abundant, whereas the MBD2 level was largely constant throughout the cell cycle. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that MBD3 may play an important role in the S phase. We hypothesize that the MBD2-MBD3 complex recognizes hemi-methylated DNA concurrent with DNA replication and recruits histone deacetylase complexes, as well as DNMT1, to establish and/or maintain the transcriptionally repressed chromatin.