A screening analysis of the GJB2 c.176 del 16 mutation responsible for hereditary deafness in a Chinese family

Objective:To determine whether a new-born child from a family carrying a deafness gene needs cochlear implantation to avoid dysphonia by screening and sequencing a deafness-related gene.Results:Both screening and sequencing results confirmed that the new born child had a normal GJB2 gene despite the fact that she has a brother suffering from hearing loss triggered by an allelic GJB2 c.176 del 16 mutation.We cloned the GJB2 genes derived from their respective blood genomic DNA into GFP fused plasmids and transfected those plasmids into the 293 T cell line to test for gene function.While the mutated GJB2gene(GJB2 c.176 del 16) of her deaf brother was found to be unable to form the gap junction structure between two adjacent cells,the baby girl’s GJB2 gene ran into no such problems.Conclusion:The screening and sequencing as well as the GJB2 gene function tests invariably showed results consistent with the ABR tested hearing phenotype,which means that the child,with a normal wild type GJB2 gene,does not need early intervention to prevent her from developing hearing loss and dysphonia at a later stage in life.

A CRISPRi mediated self-inducible system for dynamic regulation of TCA cycle and improvement of itaconic acid production in Escherichia coli

Itaconic acid(ITA),an effective alternative fossil fuel,derives from the bypass pathway of the tricarboxylic acid(TCA)cycle.Therefore,the imbalance of metabolic flux between TCA cycle and ITA biosynthetic pathway seriously limits the production of ITA.The optimization of flux distribution between biomass and production has the potential to the productivity of ITA.Based on the previously constructed strain Escherichia coli MG1655Δ1-SAS-3(ITA titer:1.87 g/L),a CRISPRi-mediated self-inducible system(CiMS),which contained a responsive module based on the ITA biosensor YpItcR/Pccl and a regulative CRISPRi-mediated interferential module,was developed to regulate the flux of the TCA cycle and to enhance the capacity of the strain to produce ITA.First,a higher ITA-yielding strain,Δ4-Prmd-SAS-3(ITA titer:3.20 g/L),derived fromΔ1-SAS-3,was constructed by replacing the promoter PJ23100,for the expression of ITA synthesis genes,with Prmd and knocking out the three bypass genes poxB,pflB,and ldhA.Subsequently,the CiMS was used to inhibit the expression of key genes icd,pykA,and sucCD to dynamically balance the metabolic flux between TCA cycle and ITA biosynthetic pathway during the ITA production stage.The constructed strainΔ4-Prmd-SAS-3 under the dynamic regulation of the CiMS,showed a 23%increase in the ITA titer,which reached 3.93 g/L.This study indicated that CiMS was a practical strategy to dynamically and precisely regulated the metabolic flux in microbial cell factories.