{"doi":"10.1101/2022.06.29.498124","title":"The conserved, secreted protease inhibitor MLT-11 is necessary for <i>C. elegans</i> molting and embryogenesis","abstract":"ABSTRACT Apical extracellular matrices (aECMs) are associated with all epithelia and form a protective layer against biotic and abiotic threats in the environment. C. elegans molting offers a powerful entry point to understanding developmentally programmed aECM remodeling. Several protease inhibitors are implicated in molting, but their functions remain poorly understood. Here we characterize mlt-11 , an unusual protease inhibitor with 10 conserved Kunitz domains. MLT-11 oscillates and is localized in the cuticle and in lysosomes in larvae and in the embryonic sheath starting at the 3-fold embryo stage. mlt-11 (RNAi) produced a developmental delay, motility defects, failed apolysis, and a defective cuticle barrier. mlt-11 null and C-terminal Kunitz domain deletion mutants are embryonic lethal while N-terminal deletions cause a rolling phenotype indicative of cuticle structure abnormalities. mlt-11 activity is primarily necessary in seam and hypodermal cells and accordingly mlt-11 (RNAi) causes defects in localization of the collagens ROL-6 and BLI-1 over the cuticle. mlt-11 (RNAi) molting phenotypes can be suppressed by genetically inhibiting endocytosis. Our model is that MLT-11 is acting in the aECM to coordinate remodeling and timely ecdysis.","journal":"bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)","year":2022,"id":297979,"datarank":0.31191623125197543,"base_score":2.0794415416798357,"endowment":2.0794415416798357,"self_citation_contribution":0.31191623125197543,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.31191623125197543,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":7,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9624,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":559267,"name":"Max T. Levenson","orcid":"0000-0002-1470-3968","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":337406,"name":"John Clancy","orcid":"0000-0003-2867-9740","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":809934,"name":"An A. Vo","orcid":"0000-0002-3130-6235","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":987015,"name":"Vivian Pham","orcid":null,"position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":492350,"name":"Jordan D. Ward","orcid":"0000-0001-9870-8936","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":492342,"name":"James Matthew Ragle","orcid":"0000-0002-6626-2615","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":50,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:31:31.270564Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}