Dataset Information

Temporal control of message stability in the life cycle of double-stranded RNA bacteriophage phi8.

ABSTRACT: The cystoviruses have genomes of three double-stranded RNA segments. The genes of the L transcript are expressed early in infection, while those of M and S are expressed late. In all cystovirus groups but one, the quantity of the L transcript late in infection is lower than those of the other two because of transcriptional control. In bacteriophage Phi8 and its close relatives, transcription of L is not controlled; instead, the L transcript is turned over rapidly late in infection. The three messages are produced in approximately equal amounts early in infection, but the amount of L is less than 10% of the amounts of the others late in infection. The decay of the Phi8 L message depends upon the production of protein Hb, which is encoded in segment L. It also depends upon a target site within the H gene region. Phage mutants lacking either the Hb gene or the target region do not show the late control of L message quantity. In addition to having a role as a negative regulator, Hb functions to neutralize the activity of protein J, encoded by segment S, which causes the degradation of all viral transcripts.

SUBMITTER: Qiao X

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2612379 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Jan

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Temporal control of message stability in the life cycle of double-stranded RNA bacteriophage phi8.

Qiao Xueying X Sun Yang Y Qiao Jian J Mindich Leonard L

Journal of virology 20081029 2

The cystoviruses have genomes of three double-stranded RNA segments. The genes of the L transcript are expressed early in infection, while those of M and S are expressed late. In all cystovirus groups but one, the quantity of the L transcript late in infection is lower than those of the other two because of transcriptional control. In bacteriophage Phi8 and its close relatives, transcription of L is not controlled; instead, the L transcript is turned over rapidly late in infection. The three mes ...[more]

PMID: 18971268

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Project description:Bacteriophages are considered the most abundant entities on earth. However, there are merely seven sequenced double-stranded RNA (dsRNA) phages, compared to thousands of sequenced double-stranded DNA (dsDNA) phages. Interestingly, dsRNA viruses are quite common in fungi and usually have a lifestyle of commensalism or mutualism. Thus, the classical protocol of using double-layer agar plates to characterize phage plaques might be significantly biased in the isolation of dsRNA phages beyond strictly lytic lifestyles. Thus, we applied a protocol for isolating fungal viruses to identify RNA phages in bacteria and successfully isolated a novel dsRNA phage, phiNY, from Microvirgula aerodenitrificans. phiNY has a genome consisting of three dsRNA segments, and its genome sequence has no nucleotide sequence similarity with any other phage. Although phiNY encodes a lytic protein of glycoside hydrolase, and phage particles are consistently released during bacterial growth, phiNY replication did not block bacterial growth, nor did it form any plaques on agar plates. More strikingly, the phiNY-infected strain grew faster than the phiNY-negative strain, indicating a mutualistic parasitic lifestyle. Thus, this study not only reveals a new mutualistic parasitic dsRNA phage but also implies that other virus isolation methods would be valuable to identify phages with nonlytic lifestyles. IMPORTANCE Viruses with dsRNA genomes are quite diverse and infect organisms in all three domains of life. Although dsRNA viruses that infect humans, plants, and fungi are quite common, dsRNA viruses that infect bacteria, known as bacteriophages, are quite understudied, and only seven dsRNA phages have been sequenced so far. One possible explanation for the rare isolation of dsRNA phages might be the protocol of the double-layer agar plate assay. Phages without strictly lytic lifestyles might not form plaques. Thus, we applied the protocol of isolating fungal viruses to identify RNA phages inside bacteria and successfully isolated a novel dsRNA phage, phiNY, with a mutualistic parasitic lifestyle. This study implies that dsRNA phages without strictly lytic lifestyles might be common in nature and deserve more investigations.

Dataset Information

Temporal control of message stability in the life cycle of double-stranded RNA bacteriophage phi8.

Publications

Temporal control of message stability in the life cycle of double-stranded RNA bacteriophage phi8.

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