Byrne, MJ orcid.org/0000-0001-8111-4605, Iadanza, MG, Perez, MA et al. (7 more authors) (2021) Cryo-EM structures of an insecticidal Bt toxin reveal its mechanism of action on the membrane. Nature Communications, 12 (1). 2791. ISSN 2041-1723
Abstract
Insect pests are a major cause of crop losses worldwide, with an estimated economic cost of $470 billion annually. Biotechnological tools have been introduced to control such insects without the need for chemical pesticides; for instance, the development of transgenic plants harbouring genes encoding insecticidal proteins. The Vip3 (vegetative insecticidal protein 3) family proteins from Bacillus thuringiensis convey toxicity to species within the Lepidoptera, and have wide potential applications in commercial agriculture. Vip3 proteins are proposed to exert their insecticidal activity through pore formation, though to date there is no mechanistic description of how this occurs on the membrane. Here we present cryo-EM structures of a Vip3 family toxin in both inactive and activated forms in conjunction with structural and functional data on toxin–membrane interactions. Together these data demonstrate that activated Vip3Bc1 complex is able to insert into membranes in a highly efficient manner, indicating that receptor binding is the likely driver of Vip3 specificity.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © The Author(s) 2021. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Engineering & Physical Sciences (Leeds) > School of Chemistry (Leeds) > Physical Chemistry (Leeds) The University of Leeds > Faculty of Biological Sciences (Leeds) > School of Molecular and Cellular Biology (Leeds) > Cryo EM, Image Processing (Leeds) The University of Leeds > Faculty of Biological Sciences (Leeds) > School of Molecular and Cellular Biology (Leeds) > Structural Molecular Biology (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 03 Jun 2021 13:38 |
Last Modified: | 25 Jun 2023 22:40 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Nature Research |
Identification Number: | 10.1038/s41467-021-23146-4 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:174761 |