Morphology of Microstructures of Oil Components with Increased Stability against Biological Decomposition

The electron microscopy study of various types of oil-containing samples (soil polluted by stocktank oil, low-density fraction (< 1.4 g/cm3) of the oily sludge after all stages of the technological scheme of phytoremediation, and arable chernozem exposed to regular pollution by overland runoff from the sites of operational oil wells) has been performed. The transmission electron microscopy has shown the presence of electron-opaque spatially structured organic formations with different morphologies and linear size

New group of transmembrane proteins associated with desiccation tolerance in the anhydrobiotic midge Polypedilum vanderplanki

© 2020, The Author(s). Larvae of the sleeping chironomid Polypedilum vanderplanki are known for their extraordinary ability to survive complete desiccation in an ametabolic state called “anhydrobiosis”. The unique feature of P. vanderplanki genome is the presence of expanded gene clusters associated with anhydrobiosis. While several such clusters represent orthologues of known genes, there is a distinct set of genes unique for P. vanderplanki. These include Lea-Island-Located (LIL) genes with no known orthologues except two of LEA genes of P. vanderplanki, PvLea1 and PvLea3. However, PvLIL proteins lack typical features of LEA such as the state of intrinsic disorder, hydrophilicity and characteristic LEA_4 motif. They possess four to five transmembrane domains each and we confirmed membrane targeting for three PvLILs. Conserved amino acids in PvLIL are located in transmembrane domains or nearby. PvLEA1 and PvLEA3 proteins are chimeras combining LEA-like parts and transmembrane domains, shared with PvLIL proteins. We have found that PvLil genes are highly upregulated during anhydrobiosis induction both in larvae of P. vanderplanki and P. vanderplanki-derived cultured cell line, Pv11. Thus, PvLil are a new intriguing group of genes that are likely to be associated with anhydrobiosis due to their common origin with some LEA genes and their induction during anhydrobiosis