CryoET of bacterial RNA polymerase with several detergents
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Darst Seth
PROVIDER: EMPIAR-10214 | biostudies-other |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other
Similar Datasets
Project description:Since its discovery and characterization in the early 1960s (Hurwitz, J. The discovery of RNA polymerase. J. Biol. Chem. 2005, 280, 42477-42485), an enormous amount of biochemical, biophysical and genetic data has been collected on bacterial RNA polymerase (RNAP). In the late 1990s, structural information pertaining to bacterial RNAP has emerged that provided unprecedented insights into the function and mechanism of RNA transcription. In this review, I list all structures related to bacterial RNAP (as determined by X-ray crystallography and NMR methods available from the Protein Data Bank), describe their contributions to bacterial transcription research and discuss the role that small molecules play in inhibiting bacterial RNA transcription.
| S-EPMC4496699 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Transcription initiation is highly regulated in bacterial cells, allowing adaptive gene regulation in response to environment cues. One class of promoter specificity factor called sigma54 enables such adaptive gene expression through its ability to lock the RNA polymerase down into a state unable to melt out promoter DNA for transcription initiation. Promoter DNA opening then occurs through the action of specialized transcription control proteins called bacterial enhancer-binding proteins (bEBPs) that remodel the sigma54 factor within the closed promoter complexes. The remodelling of sigma54 occurs through an ATP-binding and hydrolysis reaction carried out by the bEBPs. The regulation of bEBP self-assembly into typically homomeric hexamers allows regulated gene expression since the self-assembly is required for bEBP ATPase activity and its direct engagement with the sigma54 factor during the remodelling reaction. Crystallographic studies have now established that in the closed promoter complex, the sigma54 factor occupies the bacterial RNA polymerase in ways that will physically impede promoter DNA opening and the loading of melted out promoter DNA into the DNA-binding clefts of the RNA polymerase. Large-scale structural re-organizations of sigma54 require contact of the bEBP with an amino-terminal glutamine and leucine-rich sequence of sigma54, and lead to domain movements within the core RNA polymerase necessary for making open promoter complexes and synthesizing the nascent RNA transcript.
| S-EPMC5095919 | biostudies-literature
Project description:RNA polymerases (RNAPs) transcribe genes through a cycle of recruitment to promoter DNA, initiation, elongation, and termination. After termination, RNAP is thought to initiate the next round of transcription by detaching from DNA and rebinding a new promoter. Here we use single-molecule fluorescence microscopy to observe individual RNAP molecules after transcript release at a terminator. Following termination, RNAP almost always remains bound to DNA and sometimes exhibits one-dimensional sliding over thousands of basepairs. Unexpectedly, the DNA-bound RNAP often restarts transcription, usually in reverse direction, thus producing an antisense transcript. Furthermore, we report evidence of this secondary initiation in live cells, using genome-wide RNA sequencing. These findings reveal an alternative transcription cycle that allows RNAP to reinitiate without dissociating from DNA, which is likely to have important implications for gene regulation.
| S-EPMC6978322 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Transcription initiation requires formation of the open promoter complex (RPo). To generate RPo, RNA polymerase (RNAP) unwinds the DNA duplex to form the transcription bubble and loads the DNA into the RNAP active site. RPo formation is a multi-step process with transient intermediates of unknown structure. We use single-particle cryoelectron microscopy to visualize seven intermediates containing Escherichia coli RNAP with the transcription factor TraR en route to forming RPo. The structures span the RPo formation pathway from initial recognition of the duplex promoter in a closed complex to the final RPo. The structures and supporting biochemical data define RNAP and promoter DNA conformational changes that delineate steps on the pathway, including previously undetected transient promoter-RNAP interactions that contribute to populating the intermediates but do not occur in RPo. Our work provides a structural basis for understanding RPo formation and its regulation, a major checkpoint in gene expression throughout evolution.
| S-EPMC7166197 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Bacterial DNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RNAP) has subunit composition beta'betaalpha(I)alpha(II)omega. The role of omega has been unclear. We show that omega is homologous in sequence and structure to RPB6, an essential subunit shared in eukaryotic RNAP I, II, and III. In Escherichia coli, overproduction of omega suppresses the assembly defect caused by substitution of residue 1362 of the largest subunit of RNAP, beta'. In yeast, overproduction of RPB6 suppresses the assembly defect caused by the equivalent substitution in the largest subunit of RNAP II, RPB1. High-resolution structural analysis of the omega-beta' interface in bacterial RNAP, and comparison with the RPB6-RPB1 interface in yeast RNAP II, confirms the structural relationship and suggests a "latching" mechanism for the role of omega and RPB6 in promoting RNAP assembly.
| S-EPMC14680 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Nucleic acid polymerases have evolved elaborate mechanisms that prevent incorporation of the non-cognate substrates, which are distinguished by both the base and the sugar moieties. While the mechanisms of substrate selection have been studied in single-subunit DNA and RNA polymerases (DNAPs and RNAPs, respectively), the determinants of substrate binding in the multisubunit RNAPs are not yet known. Molecular modeling of Thermus thermophilus RNAP-substrate NTP complex identified a conserved beta' subunit Asn(737) residue in the active site that could play an essential role in selection of the substrate ribose. We utilized the Escherichia coli RNAP model system to assess this prediction. Functional in vitro analysis demonstrates that the substitutions of the corresponding beta' Asn(458) residue lead to the loss of discrimination between ribo- and deoxyribonucleotide substrates as well as to defects in RNA chain extension. Thus, in contrast to the mechanism utilized by the single-subunit T7 RNAP where substrate selection commences in the inactive pre-insertion site prior to its delivery to the catalytic center, the bacterial RNAPs likely recognize the sugar moiety in the active (insertion) site.
| S-EPMC3131404 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Drug-resistant bacterial pathogens pose an urgent public-health crisis. Here, we report the discovery, from microbial-extract screening, of a nucleoside-analog inhibitor that inhibits bacterial RNA polymerase (RNAP) and exhibits antibacterial activity against drug-resistant bacterial pathogens: pseudouridimycin (PUM). PUM is a natural product comprising a formamidinylated, N-hydroxylated Gly-Gln dipeptide conjugated to 6'-amino-pseudouridine. PUM potently and selectively inhibits bacterial RNAP in vitro, inhibits bacterial growth in culture, and clears infection in a mouse model of Streptococcus pyogenes peritonitis. PUM inhibits RNAP through a binding site on RNAP (the NTP addition site) and mechanism (competition with UTP for occupancy of the NTP addition site) that differ from those of the RNAP inhibitor and current antibacterial drug rifampin (Rif). PUM exhibits additive antibacterial activity when co-administered with Rif, exhibits no cross-resistance with Rif, and exhibits a spontaneous resistance rate an order-of-magnitude lower than that of Rif. PUM is a highly promising lead for antibacterial therapy.
| S-EPMC5542026 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Production of a messenger RNA proceeds through sequential stages of transcription initiation and transcript elongation and termination. During each of these stages, RNA polymerase (RNAP) function is regulated by RNAP-associated protein factors. In bacteria, RNAP-associated σ factors are strictly required for promoter recognition and have historically been regarded as dedicated initiation factors. However, the primary σ factor in Escherichia coli, σ(70), can remain associated with RNAP during the transition from initiation to elongation, influencing events that occur after initiation. Quantitative studies on the extent of σ(70) retention have been limited to complexes halted during early elongation. Here, we used multiwavelength single-molecule fluorescence-colocalization microscopy to observe the σ(70)-RNAP complex during initiation from the λ PR' promoter and throughout the elongation of a long (>2,000-nt) transcript. Our results provide direct measurements of the fraction of actively transcribing complexes with bound σ(70) and the kinetics of σ(70) release from actively transcribing complexes. σ(70) release from mature elongation complexes was slow (0.0038 s(-1)); a substantial subpopulation of elongation complexes retained σ(70) throughout transcript elongation, and this fraction depended on the sequence of the initially transcribed region. We also show that elongation complexes containing σ(70) manifest enhanced recognition of a promoter-like pause element positioned hundreds of nucleotides downstream of the promoter. Together, the results provide a quantitative framework for understanding the postinitiation roles of σ(70) during transcription.
| S-EPMC4725480 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Here we review recent findings and offer a perspective on how the major variant RNA polymerase of bacteria, which contains the sigma54 factor, functions for regulated gene expression. We consider what gaps exist in our understanding of its genetic, biochemical and biophysical functioning and how they might be addressed.
| S-EPMC4496707 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Using single-molecule fluorescence resonance energy transfer, we have defined bacterial RNA polymerase (RNAP) clamp conformation at each step in transcription initiation and elongation. We find that the clamp predominantly is open in free RNAP and early intermediates in transcription initiation but closes upon formation of a catalytically competent transcription initiation complex and remains closed during initial transcription and transcription elongation. We show that four RNAP inhibitors interfere with clamp opening. We propose that clamp opening allows DNA to be loaded into and unwound in the RNAP active-center cleft, that DNA loading and unwinding trigger clamp closure, and that clamp closure accounts for the high stability of initiation complexes and the high stability and processivity of elongation complexes.
| S-EPMC3626110 | biostudies-literature