Identification and Mechanism of Action of the Global Secondary Metabolism Regulator SaraC in Stereum hirsutum

DNA methylation is an important factor in the regulation of gene expression. In analyzing genomic data of Stereum hirsutum FP-91666, we found a hypothetical bifunctional transcription regulator/O6Meguanine-DNA methyltransferase (named SaraC), which is widely present in both bacteria and fungi, and confirmed that its function in bacteria is mainly for DNA reparation. In this paper, we confirmed that SaraC has the function of DNA binding and demethylation through surface plasma resonance and reaction experiments in vitro. Then, we achieved the overexpression of SaraC (OES) in S. hirsutum, sequenced the methylation and transcription levels of the whole-genome, and further conducted untargeted metabolomics analyses of the OES transformants and the wild type (WT). The results confirmed that the overall-methylation levels of the transformants were significantly downregulated, and various genes related to secondary metabolism were upregulated. Through comparative untargeted metabolomic analyses, it showed that OES SA6 transformant produced a greater number of hybrid polyketides, and we identified 2 novel hybrid polyketides from the fermentation products of SA6. Our results show that overexpression SaraC can effectively stimulate the expression of secondary-metabolism-related genes, which could be a broad-spectrum tool for discovery of metabolites due to its cross-species conservation. IMPORTANCE Fungi are one of the important sources of active compounds. However, in fungi, most of the secondary metabolic biosynthetic gene clusters are weakly expressed or silenced under conventional culture conditions. How to efficiently excavate potential new compounds contained in fungi is becoming a research hot spot in the world. In this study, we found a DNA demethylation protein (SaraC) and confirmed that it is a global secondary metabolism regulator in Stereum hirsutum FP-91666. In the past, SaraC-like proteins were mainly regarded as DNA repair proteins, but our findings proved that it will be a powerful tool for mining secondary metabolites for overexpression of SaraC, which can effectively stimulate the expression of genes related to secondary metabolism.

Automated summary

DNA methylation is known to regulate gene expression, but in this study, the researchers discovered a protein called SaraC that has the ability to bind to DNA and demethylate it. By overexpressing SaraC in Stereum hirsutum, the researchers found that it can effectively stimulate the expression of genes related to secondary metabolism, leading to increased production of hybrid polyketides. This discovery suggests that SaraC could be a valuable tool for mining secondary metabolites in fungi.