Ning Wang

Functional analysis of bacterial genes or genomic fragments in vivo primarily relies on the analysis of knockout strains. Although various methods have successfully generated bacterial knockout mutants, the parallel operation of multiple sites, especially in biofoundries, remains challenging. New technological refinements of existing methods are necessary for high-throughput genomic editing in bacteria. In this study, to modify numerous sites in parallel, we optimized the linear donor DNA by adding modification at the different positions and achieved high-efficiency recombination with chemical transformation. Then, by combining with the CRISPR system, we established a guide sequence-independent and donor DNA-mediated genomic editing (GIDGE) method, enabling efficient and scarless engineering of common E. coli strains as well as wild-type strains such as E. coli MG1655, with particularly marked advantages demonstrated in E. coli Nissle 1917. This method allows for high-throughput genomic engineering in a 96-well format and is useful for sequence deletion with a wide range of lengths, sequence insertion, sequence replacement, and point mutation. As a proof-of-concept study, we constructed 96 single-gene knockout mutants and a genomic large-fragment deletion library in E. coli K-12 MG1655 using the GIDGE method. This high-throughput and easy-to-use method has great potential for automation and can be adapted for use in biofoundries. IMPORTANCE: With the increasing demand in the microbiology field and the expansion of its application scope, the urgency for genome editing techniques that are not only efficient and versatile but also capable of high-throughput processing and even automation has become increasingly critical. In this study, we enhanced the efficiency of recombination engineering by incorporating modifications and integrated it with the CRISPR system to develop an advanced gene editing method. This method allows for various gene editing events such as insertion, replacement, and long fragment knockout without the need for plasmid construction. It not only demonstrated high efficiency in common E. coli strains but also exhibited marked advantages in the probiotic strain E. coli Nissle 1917. This method is a versatile, efficient approach capable of high-throughput parallel gene editing. Using this method, we successfully constructed a large-scale strain library, significantly accelerating the process of microbial engineering.

The bread wheat genome harbors three homoeologs of the barley gene HvAP2, which determines the cleistogamous/non-cleistogamous flowering. The three homoeologs, TaAP2-A, TaAP2-B and TaAP2-D, are derived from the A, B and D genomes. The importance of lodicule swelling in assuring non-cleistogamous flowering in a range of wild and domesticated wheat accessions of varying ploidy level was established. Re-sequencing of wheat AP2 homoeologous genes was carried out to identify natural variation at both the nucleotide and polypeptide level. The sequences of wheat AP2 homoeologs are highly conserved even across different ploidy levels and no functional variants at the key miR172 targeting site were detected. These results indicate that engineering of cleistogamous wheat will require the presence of a functional TaAP2 modification at each of the three homoeologs.