Ecdysis triggering hormone peptide in the African malaria mosquito Anopheles gambiae: The peptide structure for receptor activation

Abstract

Infections by mosquito‐borne diseases represent one of the leading causes of death in third world countries. The rapid progression of resistance to conventional insecticide causes a significant threat to the highly efficient preventive methods currently in place. Insect neuropeptidergic system offers potential targets to control the insect vectors. The essential roles of the neuropeptide ecdysis triggering hormone (ETH) in insect development and reproduction led us to attempt understanding of the fundamentals of the biochemical interaction between ETH and its receptor in the African malaria mosquito Anopheles gambiae. One of two ETH peptides of the African malaria mosquito (AgETH1), a small peptide hormone with 17 amino acid residues (SESPGFFIKLSKSVPRI‐NH2), was studied to elucidate its molecular structure. N‐termini deletions and mutations of conserved amino acids in the ligand revealed the critical residues for the receptor activation. The solution structure of AgETH1 using 2D 1H‐1H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and nuclear overhauser effect (NOE) derived constraints revealed a short alpha helix between residues 3S and 11S. The NMR solution structure of AgETH1 will be of significant assistance for designing a new class of insecticidal compounds that acts on the AgETH receptor aiming for in silico docking studies.

New Insights into the Plutella xylostella Detoxifying Enzymes: Sequence Evolution, Structural Similarity, Functional Diversity, and Application Prospects of Glucosinolate Sulfatases

“…141 Furthermore, the well-identified insect neuropeptideergic system offers potential targets to control insect vectors. 142 It has been previously shown that residues 65−80 in HsSulf A, which includes the critical Cys at position 69, are essential for the interaction between HsSulf and HsSumf1 under in vitro microsome conditions. 143 Moreover, single or multiple amino acid mutational analyses on peptides-derived from HsSulfs demonstrated that a core motif, pentapeptide CXPSR (X stands for any amino acid), were crucial for the recognition of eukaryotic sulfatases by HsSumf1.…”

“…Subsequently, their roles expanded to encompass various development, morphogenesis, and reproduction aspects . Furthermore, the well-identified insect neuropeptide­ergic system offers potential targets to control insect vectors …”

The ecdysis triggering hormone system is essential for reproductive success in Mythimna separata (Walker)

“…Ecdysis triggering hormone (ETH) was first discovered and located in the tracheal epithelial gland of Manduca sexta (Lepidoptera: Sphingidae) (Žitňan et al, 1996) and affects physiological functions upon binding to its receptors (Dembele et al, 2022; Park et al, 2003). Currently, ETH has been identified and is associated with moulting in insects, including Lepidoptera (Žitňan et al, 2002), Diptera (Park et al, 2002; Shi et al, 2017), Coleoptera (Arakane et al, 2008), Hemiptera (Roller et al, 2010), Hymenoptera (Roller et al, 2010), and Orthoptera (Lenaerts et al, 2017), as well as in Arachnida (Zhu et al, 2019) and crustaceans (Nhut et al, 2020).…”

The Active Site of the Enzyme 10-Formyl-THFDH in the Honey Bee Apis mellifera—A Key Player in Formic Acid Detoxification

“…As a result, time-consuming methods for molecular prediction, such as nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), can be replaced by such machine learning-based approaches. Nevertheless, for complex interactions in and between large macromolecules, such as the interaction between RNA and proteins and in-between proteins, experimental techniques, including but not limited to NMR and X-Ray crystallography, can be applied [28,29]. These laboratory techniques are also the basis for a commonly used approach for structural prediction based on homology modeling.…”