Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleResearchpeer review

Authors

  • Annett Erkes
  • Stefanie Mücke
  • Maik Reschke
  • Jens Boch
  • Jan Grau

Research Organisations

External Research Organisations

  • Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg
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Details

Original languageEnglish
Article number914
JournalBMC GENOMICS
Volume22
Issue number1
Publication statusPublished - 29 Dec 2021

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The yield of many crop plants can be substantially reduced by plant-pathogenic Xanthomonas bacteria. The infection strategy of many Xanthomonas strains is based on transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs), which are secreted into the host cells and act as transcriptional activators of plant genes that are beneficial for the bacteria.The modular DNA binding domain of TALEs contains tandem repeats, each comprising two hyper-variable amino acids. These repeat-variable diresidues (RVDs) bind to their target box and determine the specificity of a TALE.All available tools for the prediction of TALE targets within the host plant suffer from many false positives. In this paper we propose a strategy to improve prediction accuracy by considering the epigenetic state of the host plant genome in the region of the target box.

RESULTS: To this end, we extend our previously published tool PrediTALE by considering two epigenetic features: (i) chromatin accessibility of potentially bound regions and (ii) DNA methylation of cytosines within target boxes. Here, we determine the epigenetic features from publicly available DNase-seq, ATAC-seq, and WGBS data in rice.We benchmark the utility of both epigenetic features separately and in combination, deriving ground-truth from RNA-seq data of infections studies in rice. We find an improvement for each individual epigenetic feature, but especially the combination of both.Having established an advantage in TALE target predicting considering epigenetic features, we use these data for promoterome and genome-wide scans by our new tool EpiTALE, leading to several novel putative virulence targets.

CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that it would be worthwhile to collect condition-specific chromatin accessibility data and methylation information when studying putative virulence targets of Xanthomonas TALEs.

Keywords

    Bacterial Proteins/genetics, Epigenesis, Genetic, Plant Diseases/genetics, Transcription Activator-Like Effectors/genetics, Xanthomonas/genetics, Chromatin, Computational prediction, Transcription activator-like effector, DNA methylation

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology(all)
  • Genetics
  • Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology(all)
  • Biotechnology

Cite this

Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction. / Erkes, Annett; Mücke, Stefanie; Reschke, Maik et al.
In: BMC GENOMICS, Vol. 22, No. 1, 914, 29.12.2021.

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleResearchpeer review

Erkes, A, Mücke, S, Reschke, M, Boch, J & Grau, J 2021, 'Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction', BMC GENOMICS, vol. 22, no. 1, 914. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12864-021-08210-z
Erkes, A., Mücke, S., Reschke, M., Boch, J., & Grau, J. (2021). Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction. BMC GENOMICS, 22(1), Article 914. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12864-021-08210-z
Erkes A, Mücke S, Reschke M, Boch J, Grau J. Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction. BMC GENOMICS. 2021 Dec 29;22(1):914. doi: 10.1186/s12864-021-08210-z
Erkes, Annett ; Mücke, Stefanie ; Reschke, Maik et al. / Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction. In: BMC GENOMICS. 2021 ; Vol. 22, No. 1.
Download
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title = "Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction",
abstract = "BACKGROUND: The yield of many crop plants can be substantially reduced by plant-pathogenic Xanthomonas bacteria. The infection strategy of many Xanthomonas strains is based on transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs), which are secreted into the host cells and act as transcriptional activators of plant genes that are beneficial for the bacteria.The modular DNA binding domain of TALEs contains tandem repeats, each comprising two hyper-variable amino acids. These repeat-variable diresidues (RVDs) bind to their target box and determine the specificity of a TALE.All available tools for the prediction of TALE targets within the host plant suffer from many false positives. In this paper we propose a strategy to improve prediction accuracy by considering the epigenetic state of the host plant genome in the region of the target box.RESULTS: To this end, we extend our previously published tool PrediTALE by considering two epigenetic features: (i) chromatin accessibility of potentially bound regions and (ii) DNA methylation of cytosines within target boxes. Here, we determine the epigenetic features from publicly available DNase-seq, ATAC-seq, and WGBS data in rice.We benchmark the utility of both epigenetic features separately and in combination, deriving ground-truth from RNA-seq data of infections studies in rice. We find an improvement for each individual epigenetic feature, but especially the combination of both.Having established an advantage in TALE target predicting considering epigenetic features, we use these data for promoterome and genome-wide scans by our new tool EpiTALE, leading to several novel putative virulence targets.CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that it would be worthwhile to collect condition-specific chromatin accessibility data and methylation information when studying putative virulence targets of Xanthomonas TALEs.",
keywords = "Bacterial Proteins/genetics, Epigenesis, Genetic, Plant Diseases/genetics, Transcription Activator-Like Effectors/genetics, Xanthomonas/genetics, Chromatin, Computational prediction, Transcription activator-like effector, DNA methylation",
author = "Annett Erkes and Stefanie M{\"u}cke and Maik Reschke and Jens Boch and Jan Grau",
note = "Funding Information: We acknowledge the financial support of the Open Access Publication Fund of the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg( https://www.uni-halle.de ). This work was supported by grants from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft ( http://www.dfg.de ) (BO 1496/8-1 to JB and GR 4587/1-1 to JG) and COST Action CA16107 “EuroXanth” ( https://euroxanth.eu ) to JB. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.",
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Download

TY - JOUR

T1 - Epigenetic features improve TALE target prediction

AU - Erkes, Annett

AU - Mücke, Stefanie

AU - Reschke, Maik

AU - Boch, Jens

AU - Grau, Jan

N1 - Funding Information: We acknowledge the financial support of the Open Access Publication Fund of the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg( https://www.uni-halle.de ). This work was supported by grants from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft ( http://www.dfg.de ) (BO 1496/8-1 to JB and GR 4587/1-1 to JG) and COST Action CA16107 “EuroXanth” ( https://euroxanth.eu ) to JB. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.

PY - 2021/12/29

Y1 - 2021/12/29

N2 - BACKGROUND: The yield of many crop plants can be substantially reduced by plant-pathogenic Xanthomonas bacteria. The infection strategy of many Xanthomonas strains is based on transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs), which are secreted into the host cells and act as transcriptional activators of plant genes that are beneficial for the bacteria.The modular DNA binding domain of TALEs contains tandem repeats, each comprising two hyper-variable amino acids. These repeat-variable diresidues (RVDs) bind to their target box and determine the specificity of a TALE.All available tools for the prediction of TALE targets within the host plant suffer from many false positives. In this paper we propose a strategy to improve prediction accuracy by considering the epigenetic state of the host plant genome in the region of the target box.RESULTS: To this end, we extend our previously published tool PrediTALE by considering two epigenetic features: (i) chromatin accessibility of potentially bound regions and (ii) DNA methylation of cytosines within target boxes. Here, we determine the epigenetic features from publicly available DNase-seq, ATAC-seq, and WGBS data in rice.We benchmark the utility of both epigenetic features separately and in combination, deriving ground-truth from RNA-seq data of infections studies in rice. We find an improvement for each individual epigenetic feature, but especially the combination of both.Having established an advantage in TALE target predicting considering epigenetic features, we use these data for promoterome and genome-wide scans by our new tool EpiTALE, leading to several novel putative virulence targets.CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that it would be worthwhile to collect condition-specific chromatin accessibility data and methylation information when studying putative virulence targets of Xanthomonas TALEs.

AB - BACKGROUND: The yield of many crop plants can be substantially reduced by plant-pathogenic Xanthomonas bacteria. The infection strategy of many Xanthomonas strains is based on transcription activator-like effectors (TALEs), which are secreted into the host cells and act as transcriptional activators of plant genes that are beneficial for the bacteria.The modular DNA binding domain of TALEs contains tandem repeats, each comprising two hyper-variable amino acids. These repeat-variable diresidues (RVDs) bind to their target box and determine the specificity of a TALE.All available tools for the prediction of TALE targets within the host plant suffer from many false positives. In this paper we propose a strategy to improve prediction accuracy by considering the epigenetic state of the host plant genome in the region of the target box.RESULTS: To this end, we extend our previously published tool PrediTALE by considering two epigenetic features: (i) chromatin accessibility of potentially bound regions and (ii) DNA methylation of cytosines within target boxes. Here, we determine the epigenetic features from publicly available DNase-seq, ATAC-seq, and WGBS data in rice.We benchmark the utility of both epigenetic features separately and in combination, deriving ground-truth from RNA-seq data of infections studies in rice. We find an improvement for each individual epigenetic feature, but especially the combination of both.Having established an advantage in TALE target predicting considering epigenetic features, we use these data for promoterome and genome-wide scans by our new tool EpiTALE, leading to several novel putative virulence targets.CONCLUSIONS: Our results suggest that it would be worthwhile to collect condition-specific chromatin accessibility data and methylation information when studying putative virulence targets of Xanthomonas TALEs.

KW - Bacterial Proteins/genetics

KW - Epigenesis, Genetic

KW - Plant Diseases/genetics

KW - Transcription Activator-Like Effectors/genetics

KW - Xanthomonas/genetics

KW - Chromatin

KW - Computational prediction

KW - Transcription activator-like effector

KW - DNA methylation

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DO - 10.1186/s12864-021-08210-z

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