title: Big defensins and mytimacins, new AMP families of the Mediterranean mussel Mytilus galloprovincialis.
abstract: Antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) play a fundamental role in the innate immunity of invertebrates, preventing the invasion of potential pathogens. Mussels can express a surprising abundance of cysteine-rich AMPs pertaining to the defensin, myticin, mytilin and mytimycin families, particularly in the circulating hemocytes. Based on deep RNA sequencing of Mytilus galloprovincialis, we describe the identification, molecular diversity and constitutive expression in different tissues of five novel transcripts pertaining to the macin family (named mytimacins) and eight novel transcripts pertaining to the big defensins family (named MgBDs). The predicted antimicrobial peptides exhibit a N-terminal signal peptide, a positive net charge and a high content in cysteines, allegedly organized in intra-molecular disulfide bridges. Mytimacins and big defensins therefore represent two novel AMP families of M. galloprovincialis which extend the repertoire of cysteine-rich AMPs in this bivalve mollusk.
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio di Genetica, Department of Life Sciences, University of Trieste, Trieste, Italy.
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gerdol
authors.forename: Gianluca
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: De Moro
authors.forename: Chiara
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Manfrin
authors.forename: Paola
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Venier
authors.forename: Alberto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Pallavicini
mesh_terms: D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D023181:Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides / Q000235:genetics / Q000276:immunology*; D001483:Base Sequence; D049872:Bivalvia / Q000235:genetics / Q000276:immunology*; D057225:Data Mining / Q000379:methods; D014644:Genetic Variation; D007113:Immunity, Innate / Q000235:genetics / Q000276:immunology*; D008958:Models, Molecular; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D010802:Phylogeny; D012313:RNA / Q000737:chemistry / Q000235:genetics; D020133:Reverse Transcriptase Polymerase Chain Reaction; D016415:Sequence Alignment; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D023181:Antimicrobial Cationic Peptides; D012313:RNA