Pengcheng Liu

Nanjing Agricultural University | NAU · Department of Entomology

Despite the importance of reproduction in insects, its relation with multi-stop flight remains poorly understood in migratory species. To clarify whether reproductive maturation commences during the multi-stop flight or after the completion of migration, we conducted physiological and behavioral assays in the rice leaf roller Cnaphalocrocis medinal...

microRNAs (miRNAs) are increasingly recognized as important regulators of many biological processes in mosquitoes, vectors of numerous devastating infectious diseases. Identification of bona fide targets remains the bottleneck for functional studies of miRNAs. In this study, we used CLEAR-CLIP assays to systematically analyze miRNA-mRNA interaction...

Significance Many physiological events in insects are controlled by both juvenile hormone (JH) and 20-hydroxyecdysone (20E). The presence of JH sometimes alters the nature of the 20E action, but the underlying mechanisms have not been fully elucidated. In Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, four protein isoforms are generated by the taiman gene, which plays...

We detected Cache Valley virus in Aedes japonicus, a widely distributed invasive mosquito species, in an Appalachian forest in the United States. The forest contained abundant white-tailed deer, a major host of the mosquito and virus. Vector competence trials indicated that Ae. j. japonicus mosquitoes can transmit this virus in this region. © 2018,...

Krüppel homologue 1 (Kr-h1) is a zinc finger transcription factor that is upregulated in insects by juvenile hormone (JH) in metamorphosis and adult reproduction. The molecular function of Kr-h1 in reproduction remains largely unknown. Here we report that AaKr-h1 functions as an important transcription regulator in adult female Aedes aegypti mosqui...

Juvenile hormone (JH) controls many biological events in insects by triggering dramatic changes in gene expression in target cells. The Methoprene-tolerant (MET) protein, an intracellular JH receptor, acts as a transcriptional regulator and binds to the promoters of tissue- and stage-specific JH target genes when JH is present. Our recent study has...

Significance Juvenile hormone (JH) controls many key processes during insect life cycles. Some of the effects of JH are mediated by a membrane-associated mechanism. In other circumstances, an intracellular JH receptor, methoprene-tolerant protein (MET), is activated upon binding of JH and directly regulates the expression of JH target genes. Here w...

Methoprene-tolerant (Met) protein is a juvenile hormone (JH) receptor in insects. JH-bound Met forms a complex with the βFtz-F1-interacting steroid receptor coactivator (FISC) and together they regulate JH response genes in mosquitoes. Both proteins contain basic-helix-loop-helix (bHLH) and PAS motifs. Here we demonstrated that FISC is the obligato...

Animal steroid hormones are conventionally known to initiate signaling via a genomic pathway by binding to the nuclear receptors. The mechanism by which 20E initiates signaling via a nongenomic pathway is unclear. We illustrate that 20E triggered the nongenomic pathway through a plasma membrane G-protein-coupled receptor (named ErGPCR) in the lepid...

Programmed cell death (PCD) plays an important role in insect midgut remodeling during metamorphosis. Insect midgut PCD is triggered by the steroid hormone 20-hydroxyecdysone (20E) and it is mediated by a series of genes. However, the mechanism by which 20E triggers midgut PCD is still unclear. Here, we report a protein phosphatase 6 (PP6) from Hel...

20-Hydroxyecdysone (20E) is an important hormone that regulates the development of insects. Although previous evidence revealed that 20E promotes innate immunity in insects, the mechanism involved is still unclear. In this study, the HaBBP gene from Helicoverpa armigera is cloned, which contains BTB (broad-complex, tramtrack, and bric-a-brac), a BA...

Bootstrap consensus phylogenetic tree analysis of HaCal with other calponin homolog domain containing proteins. The sequences (with GENBANK accession number) included: Chd64 of A. mellifera, Transgelin of T. castaneum, Transgelin of B. mori, Calponin of A. aegypti, Chd64 of D. melanogaster, Calponin of H. armigera, Chd64 of Hydra magnipapillata (Hm...

Hormone regulation on H. armigera hormone receptor 3 (HHR3) (A) and juvenile hormone inducible gene (JHi) (B) in HaEpi cells, checked by RT-PCR. 20E, methoprene was added to cells to a final concentration of 1 µM. The cells were then cultured for 0.5 h, 1 h, 2 h, 4 h and 6 h, respectively. Blue line denotes the trend of 20E regulation; Red line den...

The statistic analysis of RT-PCR results of feeding RNAi experiments in larvae. Epidermis of the larvae ingesting dsHaCal at 5F, 5M and 6 W stages was adopted to check the transcript level of EcR-B1, USP1, Met1, PKC, Br-Z2, HR3 and JHi after HaCal was silenced. The values are mean ± S.D. (n = 3). *denotes significant difference (p<0.05, by student...

Primer list for RNAi and RT-PCR. (DOC)

The statistic analysis of RT-PCR results of RNAi experiments during 20E signaling (A) or JH signaling (B). The values are mean ± S.D. (n = 3). *denotes significant difference (p<0.05, by student t test). (TIF)

Nucleotide and deduced amino acid sequence of HaCal. Amino acid residues in the shadow indicated calponin homologue domain (Chd) (aa 27-129). The putative protein kinase C phosphorylation sites (aa 39, 73, 80, 128, 171, 177 and 183) were denoted by black solid triangle. (TIF)

Multiple alignments of HaCal with other calponin homolog domain containing proteins. Calponin of H. armigera (HM490090), Calponin of Aedes aegypti (Aa-Cal, 001652323), Chd64 of D. melanogaster (Dm-Chd64, NP_647860), Chd64 of Apis mellifera (Am- Chd64), Transgelin of B. mori (Bm-Tran, NP_001040372), Transgelin of T. castaneum (Tc-Tran, XP_975100), T...

20-hydroxyecdysone (20E) and juvenile hormone (JH) signaling pathways interact to mediate insect development, but the mechanism of this interaction is poorly understood. Here, a calponin homologue domain (Chd) containing protein (HaCal) is reported to play a key role in the cross talk between 20E and JH signaling by varying its phosphorylation. Chd...

RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) associate with RNA in cells to form ribonucleoprotein (RNP) complexes. The RBPs are involved in various aspects of RNA metabolism, but their roles in the juvenile hormone (JH) signaling pathway are not well known. An RNA-binding protein (Ha-RBP) was obtained from Helicoverpa armigera, a lepidopteran insect, which could b...

GRIM-19 (genes associated with retinoid-IFN-induced mortality-19) is a subunit of mitochondrial respiratory complex I in mammalian systems. However, its function in vivo is not really understood. We cloned GRIM-19 and explored its function and hormonal regulation in insect, the cotton bollworm, Helicoverpa armigera. The results showed that Ha-GRIM-...

MS/MS spectrum. The files contain the MS/MS spectrum information for 7 protein spots identified by tandem mass spectrum, which can reflect the m/z information. The files also contain a txt file which includes a corresponding relationship between the number of each PDF file and the gene name listed in Table 1.

Metamorphosis is an important process in the life cycle of holometabolous insects and is regulated by insect hormones. During metamorphosis, the epidermis goes through a significant transformation at the biochemical and molecular levels. To identify proteins and phosphoproteins involved in this process, we separated and compared epidermal protein p...

When an insect molts, old cuticle on the outside of the integument is shed by apolysis and a new cuticle is formed under the old one. This process is completed by the epidermal cells which are controlled by 20-hydroxyecdysone (20E) and juvenile hormone. To understand the molecular mechanisms of integument remolding and hormonal regulation on the ge...

[This corrects the article on p. e3127 in vol. 3, PMID: 18769621.].