dEMBF: A Comprehensive Database of Enzymes of Microalgal Biofuel Feedstock

PLoS One. 2016 Jan 4;11(1):e0146158. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0146158. eCollection 2016.

Abstract

Microalgae have attracted wide attention as one of the most versatile renewable feedstocks for production of biofuel. To develop genetically engineered high lipid yielding algal strains, a thorough understanding of the lipid biosynthetic pathway and the underpinning enzymes is essential. In this work, we have systematically mined the genomes of fifteen diverse algal species belonging to Chlorophyta, Heterokontophyta, Rhodophyta, and Haptophyta, to identify and annotate the putative enzymes of lipid metabolic pathway. Consequently, we have also developed a database, dEMBF (Database of Enzymes of Microalgal Biofuel Feedstock), which catalogues the complete list of identified enzymes along with their computed annotation details including length, hydrophobicity, amino acid composition, subcellular location, gene ontology, KEGG pathway, orthologous group, Pfam domain, intron-exon organization, transmembrane topology, and secondary/tertiary structural data. Furthermore, to facilitate functional and evolutionary study of these enzymes, a collection of built-in applications for BLAST search, motif identification, sequence and phylogenetic analysis have been seamlessly integrated into the database. dEMBF is the first database that brings together all enzymes responsible for lipid synthesis from available algal genomes, and provides an integrative platform for enzyme inquiry and analysis. This database will be extremely useful for algal biofuel research. It can be accessed at http://bbprof.immt.res.in/embf.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Algal Proteins* / chemistry
  • Algal Proteins* / genetics
  • Amino Acid Motifs
  • Amino Acids / analysis
  • Biofuels*
  • Chlorophyta / enzymology
  • Chlorophyta / genetics
  • Databases as Topic
  • Databases, Protein*
  • Enzymes*
  • Gene Ontology
  • Haptophyta / enzymology
  • Haptophyta / genetics
  • Hydrophobic and Hydrophilic Interactions
  • Lipid Metabolism / genetics
  • Microalgae / enzymology*
  • Microalgae / genetics
  • Phylogeny
  • Protein Conformation
  • Renewable Energy
  • Rhodophyta / enzymology
  • Rhodophyta / genetics
  • Software
  • Stramenopiles / enzymology
  • Stramenopiles / genetics

Substances

  • Algal Proteins
  • Amino Acids
  • Biofuels
  • Enzymes

Grants and funding

The work was supported by the Department of Biotechnology, Government of India. NM acknowledges CSIR for the award of Senior Research Fellowship. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.