Computational phylogenetic analysis of Bothrops snakes from venom proteomes

• Grant number: 18/06682-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: May 01, 2018
• End date: November 30, 2018
• Field of knowledge: Physical Sciences and Mathematics - Computer Science
• Principal Investigator: Marcelo da Silva Reis
• Grantee: Victor Wichmann Raposo
• Host Institution: Instituto Butantan. Secretaria da Saúde (São Paulo - Estado). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 13/07467-1 - CeTICS - Center of Toxins, Immune-Response and Cell Signaling, AP.CEPID

Abstract

Snake venoms are complex protein-based mixtures, whose proteins can undergo variable levels of glycosylation. There is interspecies variation both in the mixture composition (proteome) and in the types of glycan structures that bind to its proteins. Recently, it was presented evidences that, among Bothrops snakes, cladograms obtained using either proteome or N-glycan structures correlate with the phylogenetic cladogram produced through mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) and/or morphological characters. However, in these studies, it was not applied quantitative metrics for comparison among different cladograms. Moreover, it was not totally exhausted the usage of information contained in the peptides detected during the mass spectrometry-based proteomics assays. In this project, using the same biological information presented in previous studies, which covers venoms from seven Bothrops snakes, we propose the designing of phylogenetic cladograms that will combine information from proteomes, including their peptides, with the one from N-glycan structures. To this end, we will make use of a Bayesian inference approach, using Markov chain Monte Carlo methods. To analyze the results, we will implement a comparison metric for cladograms, which will allow us to measure the distance of the new phylogenetic trees in respect to one produced with mtDNA and/or morphological characters. Therefore, we expect to test the hypothesis that the glycoproteomic profile of venoms from Bothrops snakes is highly correlated to their phylogeny.