Detection of genes associated to plant growth promoting in two Bacillus altitudinis strains isolated for Ilex paraguariensis by using RAST annotation server

CORTESE, IJ; CASTRILLO, ML; ZAPATA, PD; LACZESKI, ME

Modalidad virtual

Congreso; 2nd Women in Bioinformatics & Data Science LA Conference; 2021

Genome annotation is a multi-level process that includes the prediction of protein-coding genes, as well as other functional genomic units. The Rapid Annotations using Subsystems Technology (RAST) server generates the annotation of genomic data by the curation of subsystems with an expert annotator across many genomes. This tool is useful for the genomic study of microorganisms with biotechnology importance, such as plant growth- promoting bacteria (PGPB). In previous studies two Bacillus altitudinis strains coded as T5S-T4 and 19RS3 were isolated from Ilex paraguariensis St. Hil. and were selected for their PGP properties evaluated in vitro and in the nursery. In this context, to advance in the knowledge of the mechanisms involved in PGP the purpose of this work was to detect genes involved in nitrogen fixation, acquisition and metabolism of iron, phosphate metabolism, and auxin biosynthesis in both B. altitudinis genomes. The preassembled genomic DNA sequences were submitted to the RAST website. The SEED Viewer was used to analyze the metabolic reconstruction of both annotated genomes based on their functioning parts. The results showed 19 genes involved in nitrogen metabolism related to ammonia assimilation and nitrate and nitrite ammonification, nitric oxide synthase and nitrosative stress; 39 genes involved in acquisition and metabolism of iron, most of them related to siderophores production; 23 genes involved in phosphorus metabolism related to phosphate metabolism and the control of PHO regulon; and 4 genes involved in auxin biosynthesis for B. altitudinis T5S-T4 and 19RS3 genomes. Also, another single gene involved in iron acquisition andmetabolism was detected only in the B. altitudinis 19RS3 genome. RAST is a useful tool to detect PGP related genes in the B. altitudinis genomes. A more comprehensive comparative analysis of the genome will improve understanding of the beneficial plant-bacteria associations.