Screening, Expression, Purification and Functional Characterization of Novel Antimicrobial Peptide Genes from Hermetia illucens (L.)

Abstract

Antimicrobial peptides from a wide spectrum of insects possess potent microbicidal properties against microbial-related diseases. In this study, seven new gene fragments of three types of antimicrobial peptides were obtained from Hermetia illucens (L), and were named cecropinZ1, sarcotoxin1, sarcotoxin (2a), sarcotoxin (2b), sarcotoxin3, stomoxynZH1, and stomoxynZH1(a). Among these genes, a 189-basepair gene (stomoxynZH1) was cloned into the pET32a expression vector and expressed in the Escherichia coli as a fusion protein with thioredoxin. Results show that Trx-stomoxynZH1 exhibits diverse inhibitory activity on various pathogens, including Gram-positive bacterium Staphylococcus aureus, Gram-negative bacterium Escherichia coli, fungus Rhizoctonia solani Khün (rice)-10, and fungus Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (Lib.) de Bary-14. The minimum inhibitory concentration of Trx-stomoxynZH1 is higher against Gram-positive bacteria than against Gram-negative bacteria but similar between the fungal strains. These results indicate that H. illucens (L.) could provide a rich source for the discovery of novel antimicrobial peptides. Importantly, stomoxynZH1 displays a potential benefit in controlling antibiotic-resistant pathogens.

Understanding sheath blight resistance in rice: the road behind and the road ahead

“…Snakin‐1, an AMP, has been shown to confer resistance to R. solani when expressed in transgenic potato (Almasia et al , ). Some AMPs like stomoxyn ZH1, purothionin, cecropin B, D4E1 and phor21 exhibited in vitro inhibitory activity on R. solani AG‐1A (Elhag et al , ; Oard et al , ). It would be interesting to see the effect of transgenic expression of the genes encoding snakin‐1 and other AMPs mentioned in enhancing ShB disease resistance.…”

The black soldier fly, Hermetia illucens – a promising source for sustainable production of proteins, lipids and bioactive substances

“…Very recently, Elhag et al published the identification of seven genes encoding for AMPS in the genome of H. illucens. Additionally, the authors also described the successful expression and functional analysis of stomoxynZH1 from H. illucens which exposed antimicrobial activity against E. coli and S. aureus [68]. However, the available data from different insects indicate that the families of AMPs are largely conserved between insects and only the number of AMPs may differ between the species depending on their respective habitats.…”

Rapidly mitigating antibiotic resistant risks in chicken manure by Hermetia illucens bioconversion with intestinal microflora

“…Larval treatment markedly decreased the abundance of manure-associated microbiota and HPB. This could be due to the immune system of the larvae or their production of antimicrobial peptides (Elhag et al, 2017). This bacteriostasis of BSF larvae would directly reduce the absolute abundance of ARGs and mitigate the risk of gene transfer to HPB.…”