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Developmentally regulated cleavage of tRNAs in the bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor.

ABSTRACT: The ability to sense and respond to environmental and physiological signals is critical for the survival of the soil-dwelling Gram-positive bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor. Nutrient deprivation triggers the onset of a complex morphological differentiation process that involves the raising of aerial hyphae and formation of spore chains, and coincides with the production of a diverse array of clinically relevant antibiotics and other secondary metabolites. These processes are tightly regulated; however, the genes and signals involved have not been fully elucidated. Here, we report a novel tRNA cleavage event that follows the same temporal regulation as morphological and physiological differentiation, and is growth medium dependent. All tRNAs appear to be susceptible to cleavage; however, there appears to be a bias towards increased cleavage of those tRNAs that specify highly utilized codons. In contrast to what has been observed in eukaryotes, accumulation of tRNA halves in S. coelicolor is not significantly affected by amino acid starvation, and is also not affected by induction of the stringent response or inhibition of ribosome function. Mutants defective in aerial development and antibiotic production exhibit altered tRNA cleavage profiles relative to wild-type strains.

SUBMITTER: Haiser HJ

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2241913 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:BackgroundThe sporulation of aerial hyphae of Streptomyces coelicolor is a complex developmental process. Only a limited number of the genes involved in this intriguing morphological differentiation programme are known, including some key regulatory genes. The aim of this study was to expand our knowledge of the gene repertoire involved in S. coelicolor sporulation.ResultsWe report a DNA microarray-based investigation of developmentally controlled gene expression in S. coelicolor. By comparing global transcription patterns of the wild-type parent and two mutants lacking key regulators of aerial hyphal sporulation, we found a total of 114 genes that had significantly different expression in at least one of the two mutants compared to the wild-type during sporulation. A whiA mutant showed the largest effects on gene expression, while only a few genes were specifically affected by whiH mutation. Seven new sporulation loci were investigated in more detail with respect to expression patterns and mutant phenotypes. These included SCO7449-7451 that affect spore pigment biogenesis; SCO1773-1774 that encode an L-alanine dehydrogenase and a regulator-like protein and are required for maturation of spores; SCO3857 that encodes a protein highly similar to a nosiheptide resistance regulator and affects spore maturation; and four additional loci (SCO4421, SCO4157, SCO0934, SCO1195) that show developmental regulation but no overt mutant phenotype. Furthermore, we describe a new promoter-probe vector that takes advantage of the red fluorescent protein mCherry as a reporter of cell type-specific promoter activity.ConclusionAerial hyphal sporulation in S. coelicolor is a technically challenging process for global transcriptomic investigations since it occurs only as a small fraction of the colony biomass and is not highly synchronized. Here we show that by comparing a wild-type to mutants lacking regulators that are specifically affecting processes in aerial hypha, it is possible to identify previously unknown genes with important roles in sporulation. The transcriptomic data reported here should also serve as a basis for identification of further developmentally important genes in future functional studies.

Project description:4-Coumarate:coenzyme A ligase (4CL) plays a key role in phenylpropanoid metabolism, providing precursors for a large variety of important plant secondary metabolites, such as lignin, flavonoids, and phytoalexins. Although 4CLs have been believed to be specific to plants, a gene encoding a 4CL-like enzyme which shows more than 40% identity in amino acid sequence to plant 4CLs was found in the genome of the gram-positive, filamentous bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor A3(2). The recombinant enzyme, produced in Escherichia coli with a histidine tag at its N-terminal end, showed distinct 4CL activity. The optimum pH and temperature of the reaction were pH 8.0 and 30 degrees C, respectively. The K(m) value for 4-coumarate and k(cat) were determined as 131 +/- 4 micro M and 0.202 +/- 0.007 s(-1), respectively. The K(m) value was comparable to those of plant 4CLs. The substrate specificity of this enzyme was, however, distinctly different from those of plant 4CLs. The enzyme efficiently converted cinnamate (K(m), 190 +/- 2 micro M; k(cat), 0.475 +/- 0.012 s(-1)), which is a very poor substrate for plant 4CLs. Furthermore, the enzyme showed only low activity toward caffeate and no activity toward ferulate, both of which are generally good substrates for plant 4CLs. The enzyme was therefore named ScCCL for S. coelicolor A3(2) cinnamate CoA ligase. To determine the amino acid residues providing the unique substrate specificity of ScCCL, eight ScCCL mutant enzymes having a mutation(s) at amino acid residues that probably line up along the substrate-binding pocket were generated. Mutant A294G used caffeate as a substrate more efficiently than ScCCL, and mutant A294G/A318G used ferulate, which ScCCL could not use as a substrate, suggesting that Ala(294) and Ala(318) are involved in substrate recognition. Furthermore, the catalytic activities of A294G and A294G/A318G toward cinnamate and 4-coumarate were greatly enhanced compared with those of the wild-type enzyme.

Project description:Nucleoid-associated proteins (NAPs) are small, highly abundant transcriptional regulators with low sequence specificity which are involved in multiple DNA-related processes including gene expression, DNA protection, recombination/repair and nucleoid structuring. Through these functions they are able to regulate important phenotypic properties including virulence, secondary metabolism and stress resistance. However the set of NAPs known within the Actinobacteria is small and incomplete. The missing proteins are likely to be key regulators of virulence in pathogens such as Mycobacterium tuberculosis and also of development and secondary metabolism in industrially-important species such as Streptomyces. Here, we use label-free LC-MS/MS to systematically search for novel NAPs in isolated nucleoids of the model actinomycete Streptomyces coelicolor. Based on the criteria of high abundance (emPAI score) and predicted DNA-binding ability (DNAbinder score) we identified a set of 24 proteins with a high predicted likelihood of being NAPs. The approach was deemed successful as the set included known major NAPs HupA, HupS, sIHF and Lsr2 as well as the global transcriptional regulators BldD and CRP and the pleiotropic response regulator AfsQ1. It also included a number of proteins whose functions are not yet known from recognisable classes of transcription factor (SCO2140, SCO4493, SCO1839, SCO1210, SCO5405, SCO4229, SCO3198) or from uncharacterised protein families (SCO5783, SCO5592, SCO3793, SCO6482) which comprise a valuable set of candidates for further study.In this paper we establish a robust protocol for preparing S. coelicolor nucleoids for mass spectrometric analysis and develop a workflow for identifying novel nucleoid-associated proteins (NAPs) by combining LC-MS/MS with a bioinformatical analysis. The nucleoid-associated proteins of many species are known to be key regulators of virulence, stress tolerance and global patterns of gene expression. Identifying the "missing" nucleoid proteins of S. coelicolor is likely to have important implications for manipulating the production of secondary metabolites such as antibiotics. Candidate NAPs were identified. Several of these are highly conserved in clinically important species such as Mycobacterium and in many commercially important species such as Salinispora and Micromonospora which represent a vital source of novel drugs such as antibiotics, antifungals and anticancer agents.

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Developmentally regulated cleavage of tRNAs in the bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor.

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