Caenorhabditis elegans in microgravity: an omics perspective

The application of omics to study Caenorhabditis elegans (C. elegans) in the context of spaceflight is increasing, illuminating the wide-ranging biological impacts of spaceflight on physiology. In this review, we highlight the application of omics, including transcriptomics, genomics, proteomics, multi-omics, and integrated omics in the study of spaceflown C. elegans, and discuss the impact, use, and future direction of this branch of research. We highlight the variety of molecular alterations that occur in response to spaceflight, most notably changes in metabolic and neuromuscular gene regulation. These transcriptional features are reproducible and evident across many spaceflown species (e.g., mice and astronauts), supporting the use of C. elegans as a model organism to study spaceflight physiology with translational capital. Integrating tissue-specific, spatial, and multi-omics approaches, which quantitatively link molecular responses to phenotypic adaptations, will facilitate the identification of candidate regulatory molecules for therapeutic intervention and thus represents the next frontiers in C. elegans space omics research.

Model organism, Omics, Space sciences

10.1016/j.isci.2023.107189

2589-0042

Scott, Amanda

667c7003-dc41-4212-9c37-85b73c3ee54a

Willis, Craig R.G.

53d80517-a0a9-4fee-9cae-0870a7458804

Muratani, Masafumi

bcea3f76-457c-4e36-8c58-059aebf77eba

Higashitani, Atsushi

54fdb83c-6e0c-4748-a44e-387379089e06

Etheridge, Timothy

7e2a840e-e28f-4b54-ba02-dcad0561dfc4

Szewczyk, Nathaniel J.

29f9ddad-5631-4815-9cd5-e24b8b72bf69

Deane, Colleen S.

3320532e-f411-4ea8-9a14-4a9f248da898

21 July 2023

Scott, Amanda

667c7003-dc41-4212-9c37-85b73c3ee54a

Willis, Craig R.G.

53d80517-a0a9-4fee-9cae-0870a7458804

Muratani, Masafumi

bcea3f76-457c-4e36-8c58-059aebf77eba

Higashitani, Atsushi

54fdb83c-6e0c-4748-a44e-387379089e06

Etheridge, Timothy

7e2a840e-e28f-4b54-ba02-dcad0561dfc4

Szewczyk, Nathaniel J.

29f9ddad-5631-4815-9cd5-e24b8b72bf69

Deane, Colleen S.

3320532e-f411-4ea8-9a14-4a9f248da898

Scott, Amanda, Willis, Craig R.G., Muratani, Masafumi, Higashitani, Atsushi, Etheridge, Timothy, Szewczyk, Nathaniel J. and Deane, Colleen S. (2023) Caenorhabditis elegans in microgravity: an omics perspective. iScience, 26 (7), [107189]. (doi:10.1016/j.isci.2023.107189).

Record type: Review

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e-pub ahead of print date: 20 June 2023

Published date: 21 July 2023

Additional Information: Funding Information: T.E. N.J.S. and C.S.D. are members of the European Space Agency-funded Space Omics Topical Team, funded by the ESA grant/contract 4000131202/20/NL/PG/pt “Space Omics: Toward an integrated ESA/NASA –omics database for spaceflight and ground facilities experiments.” N.J.S. was supported by grants from NASA [NSSC22K0250; NSSC22K0278] and acknowledges the support of the Osteopathic Heritage Foundation through funding for the Osteopathic Heritage Foundation Ralph S. Licklider, D.O. Research Endowment in the Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine. C.S.D. was supported by a Medical Research Council Skills Development Fellowship (MR/T026014/1). For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a ‘Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising.This study did not generate any new data. A.S. T.E. N.J.S. and C.S.D.: conception and design. A.S. and C.S.D.: original draft preparation. A.S. C.R.G.W. M.M. A.H. T.E. N.J.S. and C.S.D.: subsection contributions, review and editing. All authors contributed to the final approval of manuscript. The authors declare no conflicts of interest. Funding Information: T.E., N.J.S., and C.S.D. are members of the European Space Agency -funded Space Omics Topical Team , funded by the ESA grant/contract 4000131202/20/NL/PG/pt “Space Omics: Toward an integrated ESA / NASA –omics database for spaceflight and ground facilities experiments.” N.J.S. was supported by grants from NASA [ NSSC22K0250 ; NSSC22K0278 ] and acknowledges the support of the Osteopathic Heritage Foundation through funding for the Osteopathic Heritage Foundation Ralph S. Licklider, D.O., Research Endowment in the Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine . C.S.D. was supported by a Medical Research Council Skills Development Fellowship ( MR/T026014/1 ). For the purpose of open access, the author has applied a ‘Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) licence to any Author Accepted Manuscript version arising.This study did not generate any new data. Publisher Copyright: © 2023 The Authors

Keywords: Model organism, Omics, Space sciences