Mechanisms of transcriptional activation of the cellulase genes in filamentous fungi

Abstract

  To get a deeper insight into cellulase gene regulation mechanisms in Aspergillus aculeatus, we screened cellulose induction deficient mutants from the T-DNA insertion mutant library and identified a novel Zn（II）₂Cys₆ transcription factor, which was designated as the cellobiose response regulator （ClbR）. Functional analysis of clbR by gene disruption and overexpression revealed that ClbR regulates the cellulose and cellobiose-responsive induction of the cellulase and xylanase genes in A. aculeatus. Furthermore, we demonstrated the genetic interaction between ClbR and its paralog on the regulation of manR gene which is recently identified as a pathway specific transcriptional activator.