YIA-PGR: Functional Genomics of Plant Metabolism in Model Rhizome Species

姜黄素和姜辣素是在姜黄和姜植物的根茎组织（地下茎）中发现的药用重要代谢物。除了它们在这些植物中作为着色剂和调味剂的作用之外，这些化合物已经显示出具有抗炎和其他重要的药理学性质。由于这些特性，姜黄和生姜根茎粉末和提取物数千年来一直被用作香料，作为中国和印度传统医学的重要元素，以及作为旨在减少炎症的现代草药的重要组成部分。此外，这些化合物可能成为未来抗炎药物的基础。尽管它们对人类健康很重要，但对产生这些和结构相似的化合物的生化途径（酶或相应的编码基因）一无所知。随着大规模自动基因测序（基因组学）、基因功能分析（功能基因组学）以及蛋白质纯化（生物化学）和代谢物分析（代谢谱）仪器的改进，生物化学功能基因组学方法的出现为解决这一问题提供了可能。这些技术将用于研究姜黄和生姜如何产生积累在其根茎组织中的药用重要天然产物。将对生姜和姜黄植物根茎中产生的所有代谢物进行详细表征（代谢谱）。在根茎中活跃表达的基因将被分离和测序。序列信息将用于鉴定负责这些根茎中代谢物形成的酶。这些信息也将被用于识别根茎特异性基因。感兴趣的靶基因及其相应的蛋白质将被表征为它们在根茎中特定代谢物的产生中或在根茎的发育和生物学中的特定作用。

The curcuminoids and gingerols are medicinally important metabolites found in the rhizome tissue (underground stem) of turmeric and ginger plants. In addition to their role as colorants and flavorants in these plants, these compounds have been show to possess anti-inflammatory and other important pharmacological properties. Because of these properties, turmeric and ginger rhizome powder and extracts have been used for millennia as spices, as important elements in traditional Chinese and Indian medicine, and as important parts of modern herbal remedies that are designed to reduce inflammation. In addition, these compounds may form the basis for future anti-inflammatory drugs. Despite their importance to human health, nothing is known about the biochemical pathways (the enzymes or the respective encoding genes) that produce these and structurally similar compounds. Furthermore, almost nothing is known about gene expression and metabolic regulation in plant rhizomes.The advent of large scale automated gene sequencing (genomics), related methods for analysis of gene function (functional genomics), and improvements in instrumentation for protein purification (biochemistry) and metabolite analysis (metabolic profiling), now allow for application of a biochemical functional genomics approach to this problem. These technologies will be used to investigate how turmeric and ginger produce the medicinally important natural products that accumulate in their rhizome tissues. A detailed characterization of all metabolites made in rhizomes of ginger and turmeric plants will be made (metabolic profiling). Genes that are actively expressed in the rhizomes will be isolated and sequenced. The sequence information will be used to identify the enzymes responsible for the formation of the metabolites in these rhizomes. This information will also be used to identify rhizome-specific genes. Interesting target genes and their corresponding proteins will be characterized for their specific roles in the production of specific metabolites in the rhizome or in the development and biology of the rhizome in general.