Visualisation and biovolume quantification in the characterisation of biofilm formation in Mycoplasma fermentans.
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ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Awadh AA
PROVIDER: S-EPMC8160185 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
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Project description:Mycoplasmas are fastidious microorganisms, typically characterised by their restricted metabolism and minimalist genome. Although there is reported evidence that some mycoplasmas can develop biofilms little is known about any differences in metabolism in these organisms between the growth states. A systematic metabolomics approach may help clarify differences associated between planktonic and biofilm associated mycoplasmas. In the current study, the metabolomics of two different mycoplasmas of clinical importance (Mycoplasma pneumoniae and Mycoplasma fermentans) were examined using a novel approach involving nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and principle component analysis. Characterisation of metabolic changes was facilitated through the generation of high-density metabolite data and diffusion-ordered spectroscopy that provided the size and structural information of the molecules under examination. This enabled the discrimination between biofilms and planktonic states for the metabolomic profiles of both organisms. This work identified clear biofilm/planktonic differences in metabolite composition for both clinical mycoplasmas and the outcomes serve to establish a baseline understanding of the changes in metabolism observed in these pathogens in their different growth states. This may offer insight into how these organisms are capable of exploiting and persisting in different niches and so facilitate their survival in the clinical setting.
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Project description:During embryonic development, signalling molecules known as morphogens act in a concentration-dependent manner to provide positional information to responding tissues. In the early zebrafish embryo, graded signalling by members of the nodal family induces the formation of mesoderm and endoderm, thereby patterning the embryo into three germ layers. Nodal signalling has also been implicated in the establishment of the dorso-ventral axis of the embryo. Although one can infer the existence of nodal gradients by comparing gene expression patterns in wild-type embryos and embryos in which nodal signalling is diminished or augmented, real understanding can only come from directly observing the gradients. One approach is to determine local ligand concentrations in the embryo, but this is technically challenging, and the presence of inhibitors might cause the effective concentration of a ligand to differ from its actual concentration. We have therefore taken two approaches to visualise a direct response to nodal signalling. In the first, we have used transgenic embryos to study the nuclear accumulation of a Smad2-Venus fusion protein, and in the second we have used bimolecular fluorescence complementation to visualise the formation of a complex between Smad2 and Smad4. This has allowed us to visualise, in living embryos, the formation of a graded distribution of nodal signalling activity. We have quantified the formation of the gradient in time and space, and our results not only confirm that nodal signalling patterns the embryo into three germ layers, but also shed light on its role in patterning the dorso-ventral axis and highlight unexpected complexities of mesodermal patterning.
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Project description:Bacterial biofilms are communities of bacteria that are enclosed in an extracellular matrix. Within a biofilm the bacteria are protected from antimicrobials, environmental stresses, and immune responses from the host. Biofilms are often believed to have a highly developed organization that is derived from differential regulation of the genes that direct the synthesis of the extracellular matrix and the attachment to surfaces. The mycoplasmas have the smallest of the prokaryotic genomes and apparently lack complex gene-regulatory systems. We examined biofilm formation by Mycoplasma pulmonis and found it to be dependent on the length of the tandem repeat region of the variable surface antigen (Vsa) protein. Mycoplasmas that produced a short Vsa protein with few tandem repeats formed biofilms that attached to polystyrene and glass. Mycoplasmas that produced a long Vsa protein with many tandem repeats formed microcolonies that floated freely in the medium. The biofilms and the microcolonies contained an extracellular matrix which contained Vsa protein, lipid, DNA, and saccharide. As variation in the number of Vsa tandem repeats occurs by slipped-strand mispairing, the ability of the mycoplasmas to form a biofilm switches stochastically.
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Project description:Mycoplasma fermentans is a microorganism commonly found in the genitourinary and respiratory tracts of healthy individuals and AIDS patients. The complete genome of the repetitive-sequence-rich M. fermentans strain M64 is reported here. Comparative genomics analysis revealed dramatic differences in genome size between this strain and the recently completely sequenced JER strain.
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Project description:The features of Mycoplasma in human organ such lung and urinary tract are enigmatic. Here, the role of M. hominis in regard to biofilm formation of uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) strain CFT073 was investigated. Although M. hominis were inferred to not impact on UPEC bacterial fitness including growth and productions of signaling molecules as autoinducer-2 (AI-2) and indole, we found that the presence of M. hominis dramatically decreased biofilm formation of UPEC CFT073 as well as slightly repressed attachment and cytotoxicity of that. Importantly, this activity was observed on UPEC strain specifically, not enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) strain that exists on intestine. Whole-transcriptome profiling and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) analysis revealed PhoPQ system and anti-termination protein (encoded by ybcQ) participates on the reduction of biofilm formation by M. hominis (corroborated by qRT-PCR). Furthermore, collaborating with previous report that toxin-antitoxin (TA) system involved in biofilm formation, M. hominis increased on the transcriptions of toxin genes including hha (toxin gene in Hha-TomB TA system) and pasT (toxin part in PasT-PasI TA system). Hence, we propose that one possible role of M. hominis is to influence bacterial biofilm formation in urinary tract. Only fourteen genes were induced (2.5-fold) by the presence of M. hominis in Uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) biofilm cells. Among upregulated genes, ybcQ (encodes anti-termination protein Q homolog) and phoP/phoQ (encode DNA-binding response regulators in two-component regulatory system), were induced by the presence of M. hominis.
2016-01-08 | GSE43376 | GEO
Project description:Mycoplasma hyopneumoniae, the causative agent of swine respiratory disease, demonstrates differences in virulence. However, factors associated with this variation remain unknown. We herein evaluated the association between differences in virulence and genotypes as well as phenotype (i.e., biofilm formation ability). Strains 168 L, RM48, XLW-2, and J show low virulence and strains 232, 7448, 7422, 168, NJ, and LH show high virulence, as determined through animal challenge experiments, complemented with in vitro tracheal mucosa infection tests. These 10 strains with known virulence were then subjected to classification via multilocus sequence typing (MLST) with three housekeeping genes, P146-based genotyping, and multilocus variable-number tandem-repeat analysis (MLVA) of 13 loci. MLST and P146-based genotyping identified 168, 168 L, NJ, and RM48 as the same type and clustered them in a single branch. MLVA assigned a different sequence type to each strain. Simpson's index of diversity indicates a higher discriminatory ability for MLVA. However, no statistically significant correlation was found between genotypes and virulence. Furthermore, we investigated the correlation between virulence and biofilm formation ability. The strains showing high virulence demonstrate strong biofilm formation ability, while attenuated strains show low biofilm formation ability. Pearson correlation analysis revealed a significant positive correlation between biofilm formation ability and virulence. To conclude, there was no association between virulence and our genotyping data, but virulence was found to be significantly associated with the biofilm formation ability of M. hyopneumoniae.
| S-EPMC9673451 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Plasminogen (Plg) binding to the cell surface of Mycoplasma fermentans results in a marked increase in the maximal adherence of the organism to HeLa cells, enhanced Plg activation by the urokinase-type Plg activator, and the induction of the internalization of M. fermentans by eukaryotic host cells (A. Yavlovich, A. Katzenell, M. Tarshis, A. A. Higazi, and S. Rottem, Infect. Immun. 72:5004-5011, 2004). In this study, the M. fermentans Plg binding protein was isolated by affinity chromatography of Triton X-100-solubilized M. fermentans membranes by utilizing a column of a Plg-biotin complex attached to avidin that was eluted with epsilon-aminocaproic acid. The eluted approximately 50-kDa protein was identified by mass spectrometric techniques as alpha-enolase. The possibility that alpha-enolase, a key cytoplasmatic glycolytic enzyme, resides also on the cell surface of M. fermentans was supported by an immunoblot analysis using polyclonal anti-alpha-enolase antiserum, which showed that alpha-enolase was present in a purified M. fermentans membrane preparation, as well as by immunochemical criteria and by immunoelectron microscopy analysis. Our observation that Plg blocked the binding of anti-alpha-enolase antibodies to a 50-kDa polypeptide band resolved by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis of M. fermentans membrane or soluble preparations further supports our notion that mycoplasmal surface alpha-enolase is a major Plg binding protein of M. fermentans.
| S-EPMC2168360 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The features of Mycoplasma in human organ such lung and urinary tract are enigmatic. Here, the role of M. hominis in regard to biofilm formation of uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) strain CFT073 was investigated. Although M. hominis were inferred to not impact on UPEC bacterial fitness including growth and productions of signaling molecules as autoinducer-2 (AI-2) and indole, we found that the presence of M. hominis dramatically decreased biofilm formation of UPEC CFT073 as well as slightly repressed attachment and cytotoxicity of that. Importantly, this activity was observed on UPEC strain specifically, not enterohemorrhagic E. coli (EHEC) strain that exists on intestine. Whole-transcriptome profiling and quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction (qRT-PCR) analysis revealed PhoPQ system and anti-termination protein (encoded by ybcQ) participates on the reduction of biofilm formation by M. hominis (corroborated by qRT-PCR). Furthermore, collaborating with previous report that toxin-antitoxin (TA) system involved in biofilm formation, M. hominis increased on the transcriptions of toxin genes including hha (toxin gene in Hha-TomB TA system) and pasT (toxin part in PasT-PasI TA system). Hence, we propose that one possible role of M. hominis is to influence bacterial biofilm formation in urinary tract. Only fourteen genes were induced (2.5-fold) by the presence of M. hominis in Uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC) biofilm cells. Among upregulated genes, ybcQ (encodes anti-termination protein Q homolog) and phoP/phoQ (encode DNA-binding response regulators in two-component regulatory system), were induced by the presence of M. hominis. Two-condition experiment, UPEC CFT073 alone vs. UPEC CFT073 with Mycoplasma hominis PG21 (10^5 ccu/ml). For preparing the total RNA, UPEC CFT073 cells were grown at 37°C in biofilm cells on glass wool with or without M. hominis for 24 h.
2016-01-08 | E-GEOD-43376 | biostudies-arrayexpress
Project description:Recently, the genomes of two Mycoplasma fermentans strains, namely M64 and JER, have been completely sequenced. Gross comparison indicated that the genome of M64 is significantly bigger than the other strain and the difference is mainly contributed by the repetitive sequences including seven families of simple and complex transposable elements ranging from 973 to 23,778 bps. Analysis of these repeats resulted in the identification of a new distinct family of Integrative Conjugal Elements of M. fermentans, designated as ICEF-III. Using the concept of "reaction connectivity", the metabolic capabilities in M. fermentans manifested by the complete and partial connected biomodules were revealed. A comparison of the reported M. pulmonis, M. arthritidis, M. genitalium, B. subtilis, and E. coli essential genes and the genes predicted from the M64 genome indicated that more than 73% of the Mycoplasmas essential genes are preserved in M. fermentans. Further examination of the highly and partly connected reactions by a novel combinatorial phylogenetic tree, metabolic network, and essential gene analysis indicated that some of the pathways (e.g. purine and pyrimidine metabolisms) with partial connected reactions may be important for the conversions of intermediate metabolites. Taken together, in light of systems and network analyses, the diversity among the Mycoplasma species was manifested on the variations of their limited metabolic abilities during evolution.
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