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Toxins
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Proteomics and the Study of Marine Toxins: Implications for Life...
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Proteomics and the Study of Marine Toxins: Implications for Life Sciences

A special issue of Toxins (ISSN 2072-6651). This special issue belongs to the section "Marine and Freshwater Toxins".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 May 2020) | Viewed by 17409

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Alexandre M. Campos

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Guest Editor
CIIMAR, Interdisciplinary Centre of Marine and Environmental Research of the University of Porto, 4450-208 Porto, Portugal
Interests: environmental toxicology; water quality; harmful algal blooms; shellfish physiology and metabolism; OMICs
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Vitor Vasconcelos

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
1. Faculdade de Ciências da Universidade do Porto, 4169-007 Porto, Portugal
2. CIIMAR, Interdisciplinary Centre of Marine and Environmental Research of the University of Porto, 4450-208 Porto, Portugal
Interests: cyanobacteria; toxins; cyanotoxins; marine biotechnology; secondary metabolites; cyanobacterial blooms; ecotoxicology; environmental contamination
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Andre M. Almeida

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
LEAF—Linking Landscape, Environment, Agriculture and Food Research Center, Associated Laboratory TERRA, Instituto Superior de Agronomia, Universidade de Lisboa, Tapada, Lisboa, Portugal
Interests: animal and dairy science; proteomics as a tool in animal science research
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Proteomics is a discipline belonging to the OMICs research field and concerns to the large-scale analysis of protein expression. Established with the rise of two-dimensional gel electrophoresis (2-DE), this discipline has grown significantly in the last 20 years, to a level comparable, for example, to transcriptomics, with the development of highly sensitive mass-spectrometry analysis. The ability to provide information on molecular processes involving post-translational modifications (PTMs), protein–protein interactions or protein adduct formation makes proteomics a discipline very distinct from other OMICs, and especially exciting for the study of protein expression and regulation of cellular processes in biological systems. Initially more limited in its field of study, to biological models with annotated genomes, the rapid development of high-throughput RNA sequencing methods is enabling proteomics research to be carried out in many different areas of Biology, Environmental and Marine Sciences, and in many different organisms, including marine vertebrates and invertebrates. New areas of proteomics research include Ecotoxicology, Environmental Monitoring, Marine Biotechnology and Aquaculture.

This Special Issue of Toxins is devoted to one of the emergent fields of proteomics concerning the study of marine toxins. We welcome all research work in the field of proteomics with a scope on toxins from marine environments. Topics of interest include but are not limited to: ecotoxicology and toxicoproteomics of marine toxins, mode of action of marine toxins, biomarker discovery, risk assessment, metabolism of marine toxins, and isolation and characterization of new toxins.

Dr. Alexandre Campos
Prof. Vitor Vasconcelos
Prof. André Martinho Almeida
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Toxins is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • proteogenomics
  • peptidomics
  • two-dimensional gel electrophoresis
  • mass spectrometry
  • shot-gun proteomics
  • toxicity and mode of action of toxins
  • toxin metabolism
  • toxin identification and characterization

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

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25 pages, 5532 KiB  
Article
Production of Paralytic Shellfish Toxins (PSTs) in Toxic Alexandrium catenella is Intertwined with Photosynthesis and Energy Production
by Sirius Pui-kam Tse, Fred Wang-fat Lee, Daniel Yun-lam Mak, Hang-kin Kong, Kenrick Kai-yuen Chan, Pak-yeung Lo and Samuel Chun-lap Lo
Toxins 2020, 12(8), 477; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxins12080477 - 27 Jul 2020
Cited by 17 | Viewed by 3929
Abstract
To investigate the mechanism for the production of paralytic shellfish toxins (PST) in toxic dinoflagellates, with a 2D-gel based approach, we had made two sets of proteomic comparisons: (a) between a toxic Alexandrium catenella (AC-T) and a phylogenetically closely related non-toxic strain (AC-N), [...] Read more.
To investigate the mechanism for the production of paralytic shellfish toxins (PST) in toxic dinoflagellates, with a 2D-gel based approach, we had made two sets of proteomic comparisons: (a) between a toxic Alexandrium catenella (AC-T) and a phylogenetically closely related non-toxic strain (AC-N), (b) between toxic AC-T grown in a medium with 10% normal amount of phosphate (AC-T-10%P) known to induce higher toxicity and AC-T grown in normal medium. We found that photosynthesis and energy production related proteins were up-regulated in AC-T when compared to AC-N. However, the same group of proteins was down-regulated in AC-T-10%P when compared to normal AC-T. Examining the relationship of photosynthesis and toxin content of AC-T upon continuous photoperiod experiment revealed that while growth and associated toxin content increased after 8 days of continuous light, toxin content maintained constant when cells were shifted from continuous light to continuous dark for 3 days. This emphasized the cruciality of light availability on toxin biosynthesis in AC-T, while another light-independent mechanism may be responsible for higher toxicity in AC-T-10%P compared to normal AC-T. Taken all together, it is believed that the interplay between “illumination”, “photosynthesis”, “phosphate availability”, and “toxin production” is much more complicated than what we had previously anticipated. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Proteomics and the Study of Marine Toxins: Implications for Life Sciences)
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24 pages, 3315 KiB  
Article
Physiological and Metabolic Responses of Marine Mussels Exposed to Toxic Cyanobacteria Microcystis aeruginosa and Chrysosporum ovalisporum
by Flavio Oliveira, Leticia Diez-Quijada, Maria V. Turkina, João Morais, Aldo Barreiro Felpeto, Joana Azevedo, Angeles Jos, Ana M. Camean, Vitor Vasconcelos, José Carlos Martins and Alexandre Campos
Toxins 2020, 12(3), 196; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxins12030196 - 20 Mar 2020
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 4970
Abstract
Toxic cyanobacterial blooms are a major contaminant in inland aquatic ecosystems. Furthermore, toxic blooms are carried downstream by rivers and waterways to estuarine and coastal ecosystems. Concerning marine and estuarine animal species, very little is known about how these species are affected by [...] Read more.
Toxic cyanobacterial blooms are a major contaminant in inland aquatic ecosystems. Furthermore, toxic blooms are carried downstream by rivers and waterways to estuarine and coastal ecosystems. Concerning marine and estuarine animal species, very little is known about how these species are affected by the exposure to freshwater cyanobacteria and cyanotoxins. So far, most of the knowledge has been gathered from freshwater bivalve molluscs. This work aimed to infer the sensitivity of the marine mussel Mytilus galloprovincialis to single as well as mixed toxic cyanobacterial cultures and the underlying molecular responses mediated by toxic cyanobacteria. For this purpose, a mussel exposure experiment was outlined with two toxic cyanobacteria species, Microcystis aeruginosa and Chrysosporum ovalisporum at 1 × 105 cells/mL, resembling a natural cyanobacteria bloom. The estimated amount of toxins produced by M. aeruginosa and C. ovalisporum were respectively 0.023 pg/cell of microcystin-LR (MC-LR) and 7.854 pg/cell of cylindrospermopsin (CYN). After 15 days of exposure to single and mixed cyanobacteria, a depuration phase followed, during which mussels were fed only non-toxic microalga Parachlorella kessleri. The results showed that the marine mussel is able to filter toxic cyanobacteria at a rate equal or higher than the non-toxic microalga P. kessleri. Filtration rates observed after 15 days of feeding toxic microalgae were 1773.04 mL/ind.h (for M. aeruginosa), 2151.83 mL/ind.h (for C. ovalisporum), 1673.29 mL/ind.h (for the mixture of the 2 cyanobacteria) and 2539.25 mL/ind.h (for the non-toxic P. kessleri). Filtering toxic microalgae in combination resulted in the accumulation of 14.17 ng/g dw MC-LR and 92.08 ng/g dw CYN. Other physiological and biochemical endpoints (dry weight, byssus production, total protein and glycogen) measured in this work did not change significantly in the groups exposed to toxic cyanobacteria with regard to control group, suggesting that mussels were not affected with the toxic microalgae. Nevertheless, proteomics revealed changes in metabolism of mussels related to diet, specially evident in those fed on combined cyanobacteria. Changes in metabolic pathways related with protein folding and stabilization, cytoskeleton structure, and gene transcription/translation were observed after exposure and feeding toxic cyanobacteria. These changes occur in vital metabolic processes and may contribute to protect mussels from toxic effects of the toxins MC-LR and CYN. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Proteomics and the Study of Marine Toxins: Implications for Life Sciences)
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Review

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24 pages, 1232 KiB  
Review
OMICs Approaches in Diarrhetic Shellfish Toxins Research
by Alexandre Campos, Marisa Freitas, André M. de Almeida, José Carlos Martins, Dany Domínguez-Pérez, Hugo Osório, Vitor Vasconcelos and Pedro Reis Costa
Toxins 2020, 12(8), 493; https://doi.org/10.3390/toxins12080493 - 31 Jul 2020
Cited by 18 | Viewed by 7406
Abstract
Diarrhetic shellfish toxins (DSTs) are among the most prevalent marine toxins in Europe’s and in other temperate coastal regions. These toxins are produced by several dinoflagellate species; however, the contamination of the marine trophic chain is often attributed to species of the genus [...] Read more.
Diarrhetic shellfish toxins (DSTs) are among the most prevalent marine toxins in Europe’s and in other temperate coastal regions. These toxins are produced by several dinoflagellate species; however, the contamination of the marine trophic chain is often attributed to species of the genus Dinophysis. This group of toxins, constituted by okadaic acid (OA) and analogous molecules (dinophysistoxins, DTXs), are highly harmful to humans, causing severe poisoning symptoms caused by the ingestion of contaminated seafood. Knowledge on the mode of action and toxicology of OA and the chemical characterization and accumulation of DSTs in seafood species (bivalves, gastropods and crustaceans) has significantly contributed to understand the impacts of these toxins in humans. Considerable information is however missing, particularly at the molecular and metabolic levels involving toxin uptake, distribution, compartmentalization and biotransformation and the interaction of DSTs with aquatic organisms. Recent contributions to the knowledge of DSTs arise from transcriptomics and proteomics research. Indeed, OMICs constitute a research field dedicated to the systematic analysis on the organisms’ metabolisms. The methodologies used in OMICs are also highly effective to identify critical metabolic pathways affecting the physiology of the organisms. In this review, we analyze the main contributions provided so far by OMICs to DSTs research and discuss the prospects of OMICs with regard to the DSTs toxicology and the significance of these toxins to public health, food safety and aquaculture. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Proteomics and the Study of Marine Toxins: Implications for Life Sciences)
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