cazomevolve: Association between niche adaptation & evolution of carbohydrate processing enzymes

Presentation given to the University of St Andrews Biomolecular Reseaerch Complex on the new bioinforamtic tool cazomevolve, and a demonstration of its use - acts as supplementary to: https://hobnobmancer.github.io/SI_Hobbs_et_al_2023_Pecto/

Abstract:

A microorganism’s survival depends on the ability to acquire nutrients and energy. Plant cell walls are rich in lignocellulosic compounds, a significant potential source of both nutrition and energy. To take advantage of this resource, phytopathogens have evolved large and diverse arsenals of Carbohydrate Active enZymes (CAZymes) that can liberate simple sugars from the complex molecules comprising plant cell walls. It might be expected that the CAZyme arsenal of a phytopathogen is influenced by, or adapted to, the specific lignocellulosic composition of the plant hosts to which it is specialised. The broad diversity of plant life, and the pathogens adapted to them, suggests that the genomic diversity driven by this niche adaptation makes phytopathogens a rich source of novel CAZymes that might be exploited for industrial bioprocessing of organic materials. In this study, we catalogue and analyse the CAZyme complements of publicly-available Enterobacterial phytopathogenic bacterial genomes, including those of significant and widely-studied \textit{Pectobacterium} and \textit{Dickeya} species, to identify coevolving sets of CAZymes which distinguish genera and species, and that correspond to known host ranges. Our results reveal a diversity of CAZymes across Enterobacterial phytopathogens, provide insight into the evolutionary processes underpinning host adaptation, and generate a resource for bioprospection of industrially-relevant enzymes.