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Lethality and survival of Klebsiella oxytoca evoked by conjugative IncN group plasmids.

ABSTRACT: The transmission of plasmid pCU1 (or other IncN group plasmid) into a population of Klebsiella oxytoca cells reduces the viability of the population. A 2,400-bp region adjacent to traA is responsible for this phenotype and includes two regions, called kikA and kikC. Klebsiella cells which received this region and survived were found to acquire a chromosomal mutation which renders them immune to killing even after the plasmid is cured from the cells. To obtain insight into the mode of this apparent lethality, an appropriate pCU1lacZ derivative was constructed. It could be introduced with high efficiency into Klebsiella cells. Analyses of the resultant colonies indicate that the loss of viability is not a consequence of the death of plasmid-free segregants. On the contrary and unlike postsegregational killing by plasmids, cells survived by losing the plasmid or by acquiring, secondarily, a chromosomal mutation which confers immunity to killing.

SUBMITTER: Rodriguez M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC177484 | biostudies-other | 1995 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-other

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Lethality and survival of Klebsiella oxytoca evoked by conjugative IncN group plasmids.

Rodríguez M M Holcík M M Iyer V N VN

Journal of bacteriology 19951101 22

The transmission of plasmid pCU1 (or other IncN group plasmid) into a population of Klebsiella oxytoca cells reduces the viability of the population. A 2,400-bp region adjacent to traA is responsible for this phenotype and includes two regions, called kikA and kikC. Klebsiella cells which received this region and survived were found to acquire a chromosomal mutation which renders them immune to killing even after the plasmid is cured from the cells. To obtain insight into the mode of this appare ...[more]

PMID: 7592409

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Project description:Many clinical isolates of the human pathogen Neisseria gonorrhoeae contain conjugative plasmids. The host range of these plasmids is limited to Neisseria species, but presence of a tetracycline (tetM) determinant inserted in several of these plasmids is an important cause of the rapid spread of tetracycline resistance. Previously plasmids with different backbones (Dutch and American type backbones) and with and without different tetM determinants (Dutch and American type tetM determinants) have been identified. Within the isolates tested, all plasmids with American or Dutch type tetM determinants contained a Dutch type plasmid backbone. This demonstrated that tetM determinants should not be used to differentiate between conjugal plasmid backbones. The nucleotide sequences of conjugative plasmids with Dutch type plasmid backbones either not containing the tetM determinant (pEP5233) or containing Dutch (pEP5289) or American (pEP5050) type tetM determinants were determined. Analysis of the backbone sequences showed that they belong to a novel IncP1 subfamily divergent from the IncP1alpha, beta, gamma, delta and epsilon subfamilies. The tetM determinants were inserted in a genetic load region found in all these plasmids. Insertion was accompanied by the insertion of a gene with an unknown function, and rearrangement of a toxin/antitoxin gene cluster. The genetic load region contains two toxin/antitoxins of the Zeta/Epsilon toxin/antitoxin family previously only found in Gram positive organisms and the virulence associated protein D of the VapD/VapX toxin/antitoxin family. Remarkably, presence of VapX of pJD1, a small cryptic neisserial plasmid, in the acceptor strain strongly increased the conjugation efficiency, suggesting that it functions as an antitoxin for the conjugative plasmid. The presence of the toxin and antitoxin on different plasmids might explain why the host range of this IncP1 plasmid is limited to Neisseria species. The isolated plasmids conjugated efficiently between N. gonorrhoeae strains, but did not enhance transfer of a genetic marker.

Project description:Purpose: Klebsiella oxytoca M5a1 (previously Klebsiella pneumonia M5a1) is a principle model organism for free-living biological nitrogen fixation. This strain has been used for decades in the characterisation of nitrogenase function and the genetic regulation of nitrogen fixation physiology. Currently it represents a key model for synthetic biology and biotechnology approaches. This project involves a multi-omics approach to modelling nitrogen physiology in Klebsiella oxytoca M5a1, in order to inform rational genetic engineering for improved nitrogen fixation activity. Here we studied the transition from nitrogen replete (high NH4Cl) to nitrogen starved (NH4Cl run-out) conditions, the latter of which induce nif gene expression and synthesis of the nitrogenase enzyme. We mapped RNA-sequencing (Illumina) reads to our assembled M5aI genome in order to compare the transcriptome between nitrogen replete and nitrogen fixing conditions using differential gene expression (DEG) analysis. Methods: Total RNA was extracted from fixed M5a1 cell samples after culturing in nitrogen replete (10 mM NH4Cl; one replicate) or nitrogen starved (3 hours after complete run-out of 0.5 mM NH4Cl; two replicates) growth medium (NFDM). cDNA libraries were prepared for Illumina (NextSeq 500) sequencing, with a read length of 75 nt and a depth of 100 million reads. Following processing and quality control, sequence reads were mapped to a M5a1 genomic template (GenBank WGS accession JAFHKG010000000; BioSample SAMN17288411) and gene count normalisation performed (RPKM). Differential gene expression analysis was performed using the DEseq2 package utilising settings of regularized logarithm (rlog) normalisation of read counts, Wald hypothesis testing and p-value adjustment using a False Discovery Rate threshold of 0.05. Log2 fold changes between conditions were calculated for differentially expressed genes (DEGs) with an adjusted p value of <0.05. Results: Across the three samples, between 22.0-25.1 million reads (81.4-87.7%) were mapped to the genome, including 56.7-68.5% mapped to annotated genes. More than 50% of genes (2694/5279 genes) were differentially expressed (adjusted p-value <0.05) in the nitrogen starved condition with respect to the nitrogen replate condition. 925 genes were upregulated and 1117 genes downregulated by more than 2-fold. Of these, 1515 differentially expressed genes correspond to annotated proteins in the KEGG functional orthology (KO) database. The 20 nitrogen fixation (nif) genes were ranked among the 200 genes with highest calculated expression values (RPKM) in the nitrogen starved condition. Conclusions: Our study provides a detailed insight into the global gene expression profile associated with diazotrophic (nitrogen fixing) growth, revealing a dominant role for nif and other nitrogen regulatory genes in the adaptation to nitrogen stress, in addition to a large array of secondary genes indirectly associated with shifts in metabolism and growth phenotype (e.g. metabolic enzymes, gene expression machinery, transporters).

Dataset Information

Lethality and survival of Klebsiella oxytoca evoked by conjugative IncN group plasmids.

Publications

Lethality and survival of Klebsiella oxytoca evoked by conjugative IncN group plasmids.

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