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Biophysical features of bacillithiol, the glutathione surrogate of Bacillus subtilis and other firmicutes.

ABSTRACT: Bacillithiol (BSH) is the major low-molecular-weight (LMW) thiol in many low-G+C Gram-positive bacteria (Firmicutes). Evidence now emerging suggests that BSH functions as an important LMW thiol in redox regulation and xenobiotic detoxification, analogous to what is already known for glutathione and mycothiol in other microorganisms. The biophysical properties and cellular concentrations of such LMW thiols are important determinants of their biochemical efficiency both as biochemical nucleophiles and as redox buffers. Here, BSH has been characterised and compared with other LMW thiols in terms of its thiol pKa , redox potential and thiol-disulfide exchange reactivity. Both the thiol pKa and the standard thiol redox potential of BSH are shown to be significantly lower than those of glutathione whereas the reactivities of the two compounds in thiol-disulfide reactions are comparable. The cellular concentration of BSH in Bacillus subtilis varied over different growth phases and reached up to 5 mM, which is significantly greater than previously observed from single measurements taken during mid-exponential growth. These results demonstrate that the biophysical characteristics of BSH are distinctively different from those of GSH and that its cellular concentrations can reach levels much higher than previously reported.

SUBMITTER: Sharma SV

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4065351 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Biophysical features of bacillithiol, the glutathione surrogate of Bacillus subtilis and other firmicutes.

Sharma Sunil V SV Arbach Miriam M Roberts Alexandra A AA Macdonald Colin J CJ Groom Murree M Hamilton Chris J CJ

Chembiochem : a European journal of chemical biology 20131002 16

Bacillithiol (BSH) is the major low-molecular-weight (LMW) thiol in many low-G+C Gram-positive bacteria (Firmicutes). Evidence now emerging suggests that BSH functions as an important LMW thiol in redox regulation and xenobiotic detoxification, analogous to what is already known for glutathione and mycothiol in other microorganisms. The biophysical properties and cellular concentrations of such LMW thiols are important determinants of their biochemical efficiency both as biochemical nucleophiles ...[more]

PMID: 24115506

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Project description:BackgroundBacillus subtilis is one of the best-characterized organisms in Gram-positive bacteria. It represents a paradigm of gene regulation in bacteria due its complex life style (which could involve a transition between stages as diverse as vegetative cell and spore formation). In order to gain insight into the organization and evolution of the B. subtilis regulatory network and to provide an alternative framework for further studies in bacteria, we identified and analyzed its repertoire of DNA-binding transcription factors in terms of their abundance, family distribution and regulated genes.ResultsA collection of 237 DNA-binding Transcription Factors (TFs) was identified in B. subtilis, half of them with experimental evidence. 59% of them were predicted to be repressors, 17% activators, 17% were putatively identified as dual regulatory proteins and the remaining 6.3% could not be associated with a regulatory role. From this collection 56 TFs were found to be autoregulated, most of them negatively, though a significant proportion of positive feedback circuits were also identified. TFs were clustered into 51 regulatory protein families and then traced on 58 genomes from Firmicutes to detect their presence. From this analysis three families were found conserved in all the Firmicutes; fifteen families were distributed in all Firmicutes except in the phyla Mollicutes; two were constrained to Bacillales and finally two families were found to be specific to B. subtilis, due to their specie specific distribution. Repression seems to be the most common regulatory mechanism in Firmicutes due to the high proportion of repressors in the detected collection in these genomes. In addition, six global regulators were defined in B. subtilis based on the number and function of their regulated genes.ConclusionIn this work we identified and described the characteristics associated to the repertoire of DNA-binding TFs in B. subtilis. We also quantified their abundance, family distribution, and regulatory roles in the context of Firmicutes. This work should not only contribute to our understanding of the regulation of gene expression in bacteria from the perspective of B. subtilis but also provide us the basis for comprehensive modeling of transcriptional regulatory networks in Firmicutes.

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Biophysical features of bacillithiol, the glutathione surrogate of Bacillus subtilis and other firmicutes.

Publications

Biophysical features of bacillithiol, the glutathione surrogate of Bacillus subtilis and other firmicutes.

Similar Datasets

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