N 6-Methyladenosine (m6A) is the most prevalent RNA modification on mRNAs and lncRNAs. It plays a pivotal role during various biological processes and disease pathogenesis. We present here a comprehensive knowledgebase, m6A-Atlas, for unraveling the m6A epitranscriptome. Compared to existing databases, m6A-Atlas features a high-confidence collection of 442 162 reliable m6A sites identified from seven base-resolution technologies and the quantitative (rather than binary) epitranscriptome profiles estimated from 1363 high-throughput sequencing samples. It also offers novel features, such as; the conservation of m6A sites among seven vertebrate species (including human, mouse and chimp), the m6A epitranscriptomes of 10 virus species (including HIV, KSHV and DENV), the putative biological functions of individual m6A sites predicted from epitranscriptome data, and the potential pathogenesis of m6A sites inferred from disease-associated genetic mutations that can directly destroy m6A directing sequence motifs. A user-friendly graphical user interface was constructed to support the query, visualization and sharing of the m6A epitranscriptomes annotated with sites specifying their interaction with post-transcriptional machinery (RBP-binding, microRNA interaction and splicing sites) and interactively display the landscape of multiple RNA modifications. These resources provide fresh opportunities for unraveling the m6A epitranscriptomes. m6A-Atlas is freely accessible at: www.xjtlu.edu.cn/biologicalsciences/atlas.

N 6 -methyladenosine (m 6 A) is the most prevalent post-transcriptional modification in eukaryotes, and plays a pivotal role in various biological processes, such as splicing, RNA degradation and RNA–protein interaction. We report here a prediction framework WHISTLE for transcriptome-wide m 6 A RNA-methylation site prediction. When tested on six independent datasets, our approach, which integrated 35 additional genomic features besides the conventional sequence features, achieved a major improvement in the accuracy of m 6 A site prediction (average AUC: 0.948 and 0.880 under the full transcript or mature messenger RNA models, respectively) compared to the state-of-the-art computational approaches MethyRNA (AUC: 0.790 and 0.732) and SRAMP (AUC: 0.761 and 0.706). It also out-performed the existing epitranscriptome databases MeT-DB (AUC: 0.798 and 0.744) and RMBase (AUC: 0.786 and 0.736), which were built upon hundreds of epitranscriptome high-throughput sequencing samples. To probe the putative biological processes impacted by changes in an individual m 6 A site, a network-based approach was implemented according to the ‘guilt-by-association’ principle by integrating RNA methylation profiles, gene expression profiles and protein–protein interaction data. Finally, the WHISTLE web server was built to facilitate the query of our high-accuracy map of the human m 6 A epitranscriptome, and the server is freely available at: www.xjtlu.edu.cn/biologicalsciences/whistle and http://whistle-epitranscriptome.com .

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Trypanosoma brucei contains an ATP-dependent phosphofructokinase (PFK), located in its glycosomes, which are peroxisome-like organelles sequestering the majority of its glycolytic enzymes. In this paper, we report the cloning and sequencing of the single-copy gene encoding this enzyme. Its aminoacid sequence is more similar to pyrophosphate (PPJdependent PFKs than to other ATP-dependent PFKs. A phylogenetic analysis suggests that the enzyme must have been derived from a PP,-dependent ancestral PFK, which changed its phospho-donor specificity during evolution. The enzyme is no longer capable of using PP, as phospho substrate, nor can it catalyze the reverse reaction as PP,-PFKs generally can. Moreover, the presence of a high pyrophosphatase activity in the cell renders it unlikely that PP, can function as free-energy source in present-day trypanosomes. It remains to be determined which mutations were responsible for the change in phospho-substrate specificity of the trypanosomatid PFK. As a result of its particular evolutionary history, the iC brucei PFK shows many structural differences, even at the active site, when compared with other ATP-dependent PFKs. These differences offer great potential for the structure-based design of trypanocidal drugs.

Autophagy describes the process by which eukaryotes selectively and nonselectively target cytoplasm and entire organelles for lysosomal or (in yeast) vacuolar degradation. More than 30 different proteins contribute to this complex process, and it is widely recognized that the term autophagy does not describe merely a single linear pathway by which intracellular components are routed for lysosomal degradation. Yet, while autophagy has been unequivocally demonstrated in evolutionarily diverse organisms and the importance of autophagy in many aspects of human health and development is becoming ever more apparent, the extent to which autophagy in different taxa draws on a conserved cohort of readily recognizable proteins is not particularly clear. Here, we address this issue by comprehensive mapping of known autophagy components across a taxonomically diverse range of unicellular eukaryotes. Unexpectedly, our analysis points to independent examples of secondary loss of macroautophagy, the best understood of the autophagy pathways, in two parasites and one extremophile. Additionally, while our data point towards autophagy being an ancient innovation, utilizing conserved core machinery, it is also clear that lineage-specific moderation (e.g., probable loss of Atg17 in some unikonts) and elaboration (paralogue expansion) of the core macroautophagy pathway occurs readily. Finally, we also consider the interplay between autophagy and organelle turnover in protists. Here, there are likely to be intriguing issues, as exemplified by mitochondrial turnover. In contrast to the dynamic mitochondrial fusion and fission observed in many eukaryotes (including yeast), cell cycle regulated division of a single mitochondrion occurs in some protists. Yet, in these organisms mitochondrial function can often be rapidly remodeled; we contend that in these species turnover of mitochondrial proteins is the product of intraorganellar protease activity.

Metabolic resistance to pyrethroid insecticides is widespread in Anopheles mosquitoes and is a major threat to malaria control. DNA markers would aid predictive monitoring of resistance, but few mutations have been discovered outside of insecticide-targeted genes. Isofemale family pools from a wild Ugandan Anopheles gambiae population, from an area where operational pyrethroid failure is suspected, were genotyped using a candidate-gene enriched SNP array. Resistance-associated SNPs were detected in three genes from detoxification superfamilies, in addition to the insecticide target site (the Voltage Gated Sodium Channel gene, Vgsc). The putative associations were confirmed for two of the marker SNPs, in the P450 Cyp4j5 and the esterase Coeae1d by reproducible association with pyrethroid resistance in multiple field collections from Uganda and Kenya, and together with the Vgsc-1014S (kdr) mutation these SNPs explained around 20% of variation in resistance. Moreover, the >20 Mb 2La inversion also showed evidence of association with resistance as did environmental humidity. Sequencing of Cyp4j5 and Coeae1d detected no resistance-linked loss of diversity, suggesting selection from standing variation. Our study provides novel, regionally-validated DNA assays for resistance to the most important insecticide class, and establishes both 2La karyotype variation and humidity as common factors impacting the resistance phenotype.

Motivation Recent progress in N7-methylguanosine (m7G) RNA methylation studies has focused on its internal (rather than capped) presence within mRNAs. Tens of thousands of internal mRNA m7G sites have been identified within mammalian transcriptomes, and a single resource to best share, annotate and analyze the massive m7G data generated recently are sorely needed. Results We report here m7GHub, a comprehensive online platform for deciphering the location, regulation and pathogenesis of internal mRNA m7G. The m7GHub consists of four main components, including: the first internal mRNA m7G database containing 44 058 experimentally validated internal mRNA m7G sites, a sequence-based high-accuracy predictor, the first web server for assessing the impact of mutations on m7G status, and the first database recording 1218 disease-associated genetic mutations that may function through regulation of m7G methylation. Together, m7GHub will serve as a useful resource for research on internal mRNA m7G modification. Availability and implementation m7GHub is freely accessible online at www.xjtlu.edu.cn/biologicalsciences/m7ghub. Contact kunqi.chen@liverpool.ac.uk Supplementary information Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online.

The 2020 Nucleic Acids Research Database Issue contains 148 papers spanning molecular biology. They include 59 papers reporting on new databases and 79 covering recent changes to resources previously published in the issue. A further ten papers are updates on databases most recently published elsewhere. This issue contains three breakthrough articles: AntiBodies Chemically Defined (ABCD) curates antibody sequences and their cognate antigens; SCOP returns with a new schema and breaks away from a purely hierarchical structure; while the new Alliance of Genome Resources brings together a number of Model Organism databases to pool knowledge and tools. Major returning nucleic acid databases include miRDB and miRTarBase. Databases for protein sequence analysis include CDD, DisProt and ELM, alongside no fewer than four newcomers covering proteins involved in liquid–liquid phase separation. In metabolism and signaling, Pathway Commons, Reactome and Metabolights all contribute papers. PATRIC and MicroScope update in microbial genomes while human and model organism genomics resources include Ensembl, Ensembl genomes and UCSC Genome Browser. Immune-related proteins are covered by updates from IPD-IMGT/HLA and AFND, as well as newcomers VDJbase and OGRDB. Drug design is catered for by updates from the IUPHAR/BPS Guide to Pharmacology and the Therapeutic Target Database. The entire Database Issue is freely available online on the Nucleic Acids Research website (https://academic.oup.com/nar). The NAR online Molecular Biology Database Collection has been revised, updating 305 entries, adding 65 new resources and eliminating 125 discontinued URLs; so bringing the current total to 1637 databases. It is available at http://www.oxfordjournals.org/nar/database/c/.