12 Exploiting Fungal Photobiology as a Source of Novel Bio-blocks
for Optogenetic Systems
VICENTE ROJAS
1,2 , FRANCISCO SALINAS
1,3
, LEONARDO GUZMAN-ZAMORA
1,2
, ANDRE ´ S ROMERO
1,2 , VERO ´ NICA
DELGADO
1,2 , LUIS F. LARRONDO
1,2
CONTENTS
I. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
II. Overview of Optogenetic Systems and Their
Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
A. The Early Days of Optogenetics . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
B. Blue Light Photosensitive Modules in
Optogenetic Devices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
C. Beyond Red and Blue Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
III. Exploiting Fungal Photobiology as a Source of
Novel Bio-blocks for Optogenetic Systems
306
A. Utilizing Light-Responsive Domains from
Fungal Species . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
B. Optogenetic Approaches Directly
Implemented in Filamentous Fungi . . . . . . . . 308
C. Expanding Optogenetic Toolbox by
Unexplored Fungal Photoreceptors . . . . . . . . 310
IV. Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
I. Introduction
Living organisms are constantly exposed to
environmental perturbations, which vary in
time and space and lead to changes at the cellular level. In that context, light is a powerful
environmental stimulus that drives, and also
shapes, development, morphogenesis, and
physiology in a wide range of organisms including plants, fungi, and bacteria. In these organisms, light can be perceived by several lightsensitive proteins that are known as photoreceptors, which are well spread in the tree of life,
being involved in a variety of biological
responses, such as phototropism in fungi and
bacteria, flowering in plants and behavior in
animals (Banerjee and Batschauer 2004; Navara
and Nelson 2007; Briggs 2014). Although
photoreceptors differ in their biochemical
properties, in most cases it is possible to recognize specific domains that coordinate a chromophore as a cofactor. These molecules absorb
photons of a specific wavelength, translating
such difference in energy as a conformational
change in the surrounding polypeptide, affecting the structure of the protein (Shcherbakova
et al. 2015). Thereby, the activated state of the
photoreceptor is reached, triggering a molecular signal which then modulates a lightregulated biological process (Lorrain et al.
2006).
In recent years, key questions in biology are
being addressed by a discipline known as synthetic biology. This new field has promoted a
revolution in the way that biological processes
are studied. Via the rational generation of novel
genetic circuits and artificial devices, it is possible to obtain biological systems more or less
complex than natural ones, permitting the analysis of relevant cellular processes, while reprogramming their function in a predictable and
robust manner (Benner and Sismour 2005;
Andrianantoandro et al. 2006; Purnick and
Weiss 2009; Bashor et al. 2010). One desirable
characteristic in synthetic systems is the ability
to turn off and on genetic programs at will.
While this could be done using a classic chemical inducer, the latter presents several problems
such as once added it may be hard to remove or
1 Millennium Institute for Integrative Biology (iBio), Santiago,
Chile; e-mail: llarrondo@bio.puc.cl
2 Facultad de Ciencias Biolo ´gicas, Departamento de Gene ´tica
Molecular y Microbiologı ´a, Pontificia Universidad Cato ´lica de
Chile, Santiago, Chile
3 Facultad de Ciencias, Instituto de Bioquı ´mica y
Microbiologı ´a, Universidad Austral de Chile (UACH),
Valdivia, Chile
Genetics and Biotechnology, 3 rd Edition
The Mycota II
J.P. Benz, K. Schipper (Eds.)
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
for Optogenetic Systems
VICENTE ROJAS
1,2 , FRANCISCO SALINAS
1,3
, LEONARDO GUZMAN-ZAMORA
1,2
, ANDRE ´ S ROMERO
1,2 , VERO ´ NICA
DELGADO
1,2 , LUIS F. LARRONDO
1,2
CONTENTS
I. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
II. Overview of Optogenetic Systems and Their
Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
A. The Early Days of Optogenetics . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
B. Blue Light Photosensitive Modules in
Optogenetic Devices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
C. Beyond Red and Blue Light . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304
III. Exploiting Fungal Photobiology as a Source of
Novel Bio-blocks for Optogenetic Systems
306
A. Utilizing Light-Responsive Domains from
Fungal Species . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 306
B. Optogenetic Approaches Directly
Implemented in Filamentous Fungi . . . . . . . . 308
C. Expanding Optogenetic Toolbox by
Unexplored Fungal Photoreceptors . . . . . . . . 310
IV. Concluding Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 314
I. Introduction
Living organisms are constantly exposed to
environmental perturbations, which vary in
time and space and lead to changes at the cellular level. In that context, light is a powerful
environmental stimulus that drives, and also
shapes, development, morphogenesis, and
physiology in a wide range of organisms including plants, fungi, and bacteria. In these organisms, light can be perceived by several lightsensitive proteins that are known as photoreceptors, which are well spread in the tree of life,
being involved in a variety of biological
responses, such as phototropism in fungi and
bacteria, flowering in plants and behavior in
animals (Banerjee and Batschauer 2004; Navara
and Nelson 2007; Briggs 2014). Although
photoreceptors differ in their biochemical
properties, in most cases it is possible to recognize specific domains that coordinate a chromophore as a cofactor. These molecules absorb
photons of a specific wavelength, translating
such difference in energy as a conformational
change in the surrounding polypeptide, affecting the structure of the protein (Shcherbakova
et al. 2015). Thereby, the activated state of the
photoreceptor is reached, triggering a molecular signal which then modulates a lightregulated biological process (Lorrain et al.
2006).
In recent years, key questions in biology are
being addressed by a discipline known as synthetic biology. This new field has promoted a
revolution in the way that biological processes
are studied. Via the rational generation of novel
genetic circuits and artificial devices, it is possible to obtain biological systems more or less
complex than natural ones, permitting the analysis of relevant cellular processes, while reprogramming their function in a predictable and
robust manner (Benner and Sismour 2005;
Andrianantoandro et al. 2006; Purnick and
Weiss 2009; Bashor et al. 2010). One desirable
characteristic in synthetic systems is the ability
to turn off and on genetic programs at will.
While this could be done using a classic chemical inducer, the latter presents several problems
such as once added it may be hard to remove or
1 Millennium Institute for Integrative Biology (iBio), Santiago,
Chile; e-mail: llarrondo@bio.puc.cl
2 Facultad de Ciencias Biolo ´gicas, Departamento de Gene ´tica
Molecular y Microbiologı ´a, Pontificia Universidad Cato ´lica de
Chile, Santiago, Chile
3 Facultad de Ciencias, Instituto de Bioquı ´mica y
Microbiologı ´a, Universidad Austral de Chile (UACH),
Valdivia, Chile
Genetics and Biotechnology, 3 rd Edition
The Mycota II
J.P. Benz, K. Schipper (Eds.)
© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020