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Thoeris system

traitmech:000216 · CLASS · PROPOSED

A genomics trait describing possession of a Thoeris antiphage defense locus in which phage-triggered TIR-domain proteins generate a cyclic-ADP-ribose-like signal that activates a ThsA NADase effector to deplete NAD and inhibit bacteriophage replication.

Trait evidence (5)

  • DOI:10.1038/s41467-020-16703-w
    One such system is the Thoeris defense system, which consists of two genes, thsA and thsB

    Ka et al. support the two-component B. cereus Thoeris system architecture and its standard US-English name.

  • DOI:10.1038/s41467-020-16703-w
    Mutation analysis suggests that NAD+ cleavage is linked to the antiphage function of Thoeris

    Ka et al. support the relationship between ThsA NADase activity and Thoeris antiphage function.

  • DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7
    phage infection triggers Thoeris TIR-domain proteins to produce an isomer of cyclic ADP-ribose

    Ofir et al. support the phage-triggered TIR-domain signal production that activates the ThsA effector.

  • DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7
    This molecular signal activates a second protein, ThsA, which then depletes the cell of the essential molecule nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD)

    Ofir et al. connect the Thoeris TIR-domain signal to ThsA NAD depletion.

  • DOI:10.1038/s41467-020-16703-w
    One is from Bacillus cereus MSX-D12. The thsA gene and its downstream thsB gene conferred resistance against myophage infection when engineered into the model bacterium Bacillus subtilis BEST7003

    Ka et al. summarize experimental validation of the native Bacillus cereus MSX-D12 Thoeris thsA-thsB locus.

Thoeris TIR signalling activates ThsA NAD depletion

Evidence-backed process sketch linking a Thoeris locus to phage-triggered TIR-domain signalling, ThsA-dependent NAD depletion, and inhibition of bacteriophage replication.

NONMECHANISTIC · The graph captures the characterized Thoeris TIR-signal and ThsA NADase outputs without asserting one universal number of TIR-domain proteins, exact cADPR isomer structure, ThsA oligomeric state, cell-death pathway, or phage trigger across all Thoeris loci.

Thoeris TIR signalling activates ThsA NAD depletion Interactive directed graph showing evidence-backed causal relationships for Thoeris system.

Edge evidence

  • Thoeris locus contributes to Thoeris TIR cADPR-isomer production RO:0002326

    The Thoeris locus encodes TIR-domain proteins that produce a cADPR-like signal during phage infection.

    • DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7 phage infection triggers Thoeris TIR-domain proteins to produce an isomer of cyclic ADP-ribose Ofir et al. support Thoeris TIR-domain proteins as phage-triggered cADPR-isomer producers.
  • phage infection activates Thoeris TIR cADPR-isomer production RO:0002213

    Phage infection activates production of the Thoeris TIR-domain cADPR-like signal.

    • DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7 phage infection triggers Thoeris TIR-domain proteins to produce an isomer of cyclic ADP-ribose Ofir et al. support phage-triggered Thoeris signal production.
  • Thoeris TIR cADPR-isomer production activates ThsA NAD depletion RO:0002213

    The Thoeris cADPR-like signal activates ThsA, which then depletes cellular NAD.

    • DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7 This molecular signal activates a second protein, ThsA, which then depletes the cell of the essential molecule nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) Ofir et al. connect the TIR-derived signal to ThsA-mediated NAD depletion.
  • ThsA NAD depletion mitigates phage replication METPO:2007407

    ThsA NAD depletion helps inhibit bacteriophage replication.

    • DOI:10.1038/s41467-020-16703-w highlighting a unique strategy for bacterial antiphage resistance via NAD+ degradation Ka et al. place ThsA-linked NAD degradation in Thoeris antiphage resistance.
  • ThsA NAD depletion confers Thoeris system METPO:2007700

    ThsA NAD depletion is the antiviral output that realizes the Thoeris system defense phenotype.

    • DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7 depletes the cell of the essential molecule nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) and leads to abortive infection and cell death Ofir et al. support NAD depletion as the Thoeris output that drives abortive infection.
  • Thoeris system is a phage defense system rdfs:subClassOf

    Thoeris system possession is a phage-defense-system trait.

    • DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7 bacterial anti-phage defence system called Thoeris Ofir et al. place Thoeris in the bacterial antiphage-defense-system family.

Provenance

Identifier source
TraitMech local identifier
Definition source
DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7

Parent traits (1)

Synonyms (2)

  • Thoeris defense system EXACT_SYNONYM · DOI:10.1038/s41467-020-16703-w
  • Thoeris defence system EXACT_SYNONYM · DOI:10.1038/s41586-021-04098-7

kg-microbe context

No kg-microbe node embedding matched this record in the 2026-04-25 deepwalk.

Canonical examples (1)

Organisms cited as exemplars of this trait. Taxon ids are NCBITaxon and link out to the NCBI record.

  • Bacillus cereus NCBITaxon:1396 DOI:10.1038/s41467-020-16703-w Ka et al. describe the Bacillus cereus MSX-D12 thsA-thsB Thoeris system that conferred resistance to myophage infection when engineered into a Thoeris-lacking Bacillus subtilis host.

Discussions and Knowledge Gaps (1)

Open questions attached to this trait. Seeded by just knowledge-gap-scan and curated; see the corpus-wide index.

Resolve Thoeris family architecture, signal chemistry, and phage triggering before minting narrower Thoeris mechanism children.

KNOWLEDGE GAP OPEN thoeris-family-signal-and-trigger-gap · raised by codex · 2026-09-15

Not yet attached to a section of this record — a curator sets attaches_to (e.g. causal_graphs#some_edge) so the gap shows beside the mechanism it concerns.

Ka et al. support the B. cereus ThsA/ThsB two-gene system and Ofir et al. support the TIR-produced cADPR-like signal that activates ThsA NAD depletion, but Thoeris variants need separate review before TraitMech asserts one exact number of TIR-domain proteins, cADPR-isomer chemistry, TIR target, ThsA activation state, cell-death pathway, or phage-triggering mechanism.

Curation history

  1. · MINTED_TRAITMECH_ID · codex

    Minted Thoeris system as a DOI-backed GENOMICS TraitRecord under the phage defense system parent after an ignored-and-hidden duplicate review found no exact live TraitMech, METPO, or prior proposal record; the replacement placeholder is reserved in proposals/metpo_traitmech_v93.