Determinação de potenciais proteínas alvo de proteases 3c de vírus que infectam abelhas no conjunto de proteínas anotadas de apis mellifera

Abstract

The bees of the specie Apis mellifera L. are known/characterized by their/the high capacity for harvesting and storing pollen and nectar from flowers, they produce honey and play a key role on the planet ecosystem as a floral biodiversity maintainer by promoting polonization of numerous floral species. Due to its fundamental function on global agriculture, the detection and prevention of possible pathological agents with threats the bee health is an crucial task to beekeepers researchers. The major subject in bee research is the unidentified suddenly vanishment of bee population from the colony. This phenomenon is known as Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD) and it is described as an unexplained abruptly disappearance of work bees from the colony. The possible reason for this disorder is linked to various factors such as use of chemical pesticide, mites, bacterias, fungis and viruses. Under the pathogenic viruses which affect bees, the Picornavirus-like superfamily has a set of conserved genes which codify: a RNA-dependent RNA polymerase RdRp, a helicase-3 S3H superfamily, a viral genome protein binder VPg and a protease chymotrypsin-like 3C-Pro. The 3C-Pro has a fundamental role not only in the processing and maturation of the viral polyprotein by cleaving it but also performs metabolism regulation on the host cell by proteolytic degradation avoiding and blocking the antiviral mechanisms, consequently, enabling the virus insertion and replication on the host cell. The main objective of this work was to identify possible targets of viral protease 3C possible cleavage sites from DWV, SBPV, and the KIA complex and aim for the functions of those proteins in the proteome of Apis mellifera. The potential 3C protease targets sequence sites in Apis mellifera proteome were inquired and analyzed through the online database Gene Ontology. After further observation on DWV 3C protease targets, we observed three major group with altered functions: DNA-Binding proteins, proteolysis and neural development. The analysis detected the presence of the genes Apidaecina, Dachsous, Dicer-1 and Dead-box1 which functions play fundamental role in viral infection. The genes Roundabout and Shibire were highlighted in the query for SBPV resulting in a clusterization of 33 groups for affected proteins. Lastly, the results for the KIA complex clustered 31 groups highlighting the genes Brahma, Blue Cheese and Aurora Borealis. The correlation between the function of the potential cleaved proteins with the studied symptoms of the viral infection suggest that those proteases cleave proteins related to the antiviral cell signaling pathways in honey bees and this process would be performed in order to facilitate the infection process and, consequently, initiating the symptoms of each viral infection. These data would be useful on the development of prevention mechanisms or even treatments for viral infection in honeybees as well as the search for mutations in the sequences which encode the cleavage site in nonsymptomatic honey bees.