New Structural Insights Into the Extracellular Matrix And
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NEW STRUCTURAL INSIGHTS INTO THE EXTRACELLULAR MATRIX AND HYDROCARBON DIVERSITY OF Botryococcus Braunii RACE B A Dissertation by MEHMET TATLI Submitted to the Office of Graduate and Professional Studies of Texas A&M University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Chair of Committee, Timothy P. Devarenne Committee Members, Jaan Laane Vladislav M. Panin Paul A. Lindahl Head of Department, Gregory D. Reinhart May 2018 Major Subject: Biochemistry Copyright 2018 Mehmet Tatli ABSTRACT Botryococcus braunii is a colonial green microalga that can produce large amounts of liquid isoprenoid hydrocarbons known as botryococcenes, which can be easily converted into conventional combustion engine fuels. B. braunii colony cells are held together by a complex extracellular matrix (ECM). ECM serves as a storage unit for liquid hydrocarbons, and contains a retaining wall and a polysaccharide fibrillar sheath. Analysis of “shells” revealed a single protein. Here we use peptide mass fingerprinting and bioinformatics to identify this protein called polysaccharide associated protein (PSAP). PSAP does not show similarity to any protein in databases, and contains several hydroxyproline domains and a predicted sugar binding domain. Staining studies confirm PSAP as a glycoprotein, and mass spectrometry analysis identified ten N-linked glycosylation sites comprising seven different glycans containing mostly mannose and N- acetylglucosamine with fucose and arabinose. Additionally, four hydroxyproline residues have short O-linked glycans of mainly arabinose and galactose, with 6-deoxyhexose. PSAP secretion and localization to shell material is confirmed using western blot analysis and microscopy. These studies indicate PSAP contains unique glycans and suggest its involvement in ECM polysaccharide fiber biosynthesis. Moreover, B. braunii is capable of producing many botryococcene isomers ranging in carbon number from 30 to 37, as well as several methylated squalenes. Although studies have reported the isolation of isomers based on the C31, C32, C33, and C34 botryococcene ii structures, there has not been a report of cyclic C33 botryococcenes or an isomer based on the trimethylsqualene structure until this study. Three cyclic C33 botryococcenes and one new trimethylsqualene isomer were isolated from the B race, Showa (Berkeley) strain of B. braunii. In addition, a detailed examination of the molecular structure for ten botryococcenes including the newly discovered cyclic C33 botryococcenes and five methylsqualenes isolated from race B was carried out using Raman spectroscopy and density functional theory (DFT) calculations in an effort to distinguish between these structurally similar molecules by spectroscopic approaches. A comparison of the experimental Raman spectroscopy and DFT calculations indicates several spectral regions such as those for ν(C=C) stretching, CH2/CH3 bending, and ring bending can be used to distinguish between these molecules. Altogether, these studies bring more insights into understanding the hydrocarbon diversity and ECM of B. braunii race B. iii DEDICATION I would primarily dedicate this dissertation to my mother. I would also like to dedicate this dissertation to all my family for always supporting me and sending good vibes from thousands of miles away. I cannot imagine how difficult my life would have been without feeling your support with all the decisions I have made in my life. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my Ph.D. thesis advisor Dr. Timothy Devarenne for his guidance and support that he has provided me throughout my Ph.D. career. I am grateful for his mentorship, patience, and the chance he has given me to grow as a scientist in his lab. I would like to thank my committee, Dr. Jaan Laane, Dr. Vlad Panin, Dr. Paul Lindahl and Dr. Andreas Holzenburg for their time, guidance, and support throughout the course of this research. My sincere thanks to Dr. Shigeru Okada and Dr. Mandar Naik for their support and suggestions on my projects. Thanks to my colleagues and current and past members of Devarenne lab – in particular Daniel Browne whom I had many valuable discussions and good times over the years with, Dr. Hem Thapa, Dongyin Su, and Incheol Yeo for their valuable suggestions. I would also like to thank the NSF REU Summer students Laura Krings and Patrick Sweet, and Texas A&M Energy Institute summer student Alyssa Dubrow that worked with me and contributed to my work and allowed me improve my mentorship skills. Last, I would like to thank all my loving family and close friends for their great support. v CONTRIBUTORS AND FUNDING SOURCES Contributors This work was supervised by a dissertation committee consisting of Dr. Timothy P. Devarenne [advisor] of the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, Dr. Jaan Laane of the Department of Chemistry, Dr. Vladislav M. Panin of the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, and Dr. Paul A. Lindahl of the Departments of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Biophysics. Most of the work for this dissertation was carried out by the student, under the supervision of Dr. Timothy P. Devarenne of the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics. The NMR analysis of the hydrocarbons in section II was done with the help of the following collaborators: Dr. Mandar Naik of the Biomolecular NMR facility in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Texas A&M University (currently at the Department of Molecular Pharmacology, Physiology, and Biotechnology at Brown University) and Dr. Shigeru Okada of the School of Agricultural and Life Sciences at the University of Tokyo. Collaborators for section III are as follows: The DFT calculations for the hydrocarbons were done by Dr. Hye-Jin Chun and Dr. Jaan Laane of the Department of Chemistry at Texas A&M University, BCARS experiments were done by Dr. Charles H. Camp Jr. and Dr. Marcus Cicerone of the Biosystems and Biomaterials Division at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and in vitro Raman spectroscopy experiments of the purified hydrocarbons were vi completed with the help of Dr. Wei-Chuan Shih and Jingting Li of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at University of Houston. Collaborators and their contributions to section IV are as follows: Dr. Mayumi Ishihara of the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center at University of Georgia did the glycomics studies for PSAP and Dr. Christian Heiss and Dr. Parastoo Azadi of the Complex Carbohydrate Research Center at University of Georgia provided help planning experiments for the glycomics studies for PSAP. Dr. Lawrence J. Dangott of the Protein Chemistry Laboratory in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics and Daniel R. Browne of the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Texas A&M University provided help with the bioinformatics to find full length cDNA for PSAP. Funding sources This work was made possible in part by NSF-EFRI-PSBR under grant #1240478 to Dr. Timothy P. Devarenne; by the Robert A. Welch Foundation under grant #A-0396 to Dr. Jaan Laane; by National Science Foundation under grant #CHE-0541587 to the Texas A&M Department of Chemistry Medusa computer system; by a grant from the Japan Science and Technology (JST) agency program to Dr. Shigeru Okada.; by the U.S. Department of Energy under grant #DE-SC0015662 and by NIH under grant #1S10OD018530 and grant # P41GM103490-14 to Dr. Parastoo Azadi. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABSTRACT .......................................................................................................................ii DEDICATION .................................................................................................................. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ............................................................................................... v CONTRIBUTORS AND FUNDING SOURCES ............................................................. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................... viii LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................... xi LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................... xv 1. INTRODUCTION AND LITERATURE REVIEW .................................................. 1 1.1 Alternative energy demand and biofuels .................................................................. 1 1.2 Microalgae ................................................................................................................ 2 1.2.1 Microalgae-based biofuels ................................................................................ 3 1.2.2 Limitations of microalgae-based biofuels ......................................................... 4 1.2.3 Potential and future of microalgae for biofuel production ................................ 6 1.2.4 Microalgae-based hydrocarbons ........................................................................ 9 1.3 Botryococcus braunii ............................................................................................. 10 1.3.1 Ultrastructure of B. braunii ............................................................................. 14 1.4 ECMs in various organisms ................................................................................... 15 1.4.1 ECMs in plants ................................................................................................ 15 1.4.2