Project description:We utilize ribosome profiling to directly monitor translation in E. coli at 30 °C and investigate how this changes after 10-20 minutes of heat shock at 42 °C. Translation is controlled by the interplay of several RNA hybridization processes, which are expected to be temperature sensitive. We observe that translation efficiencies are robustly maintained after thermal heat shock and after mimicking the heat shock response transcriptional program at 30 °C.
Project description:We have shown the quorum-sensing signals acylhomoserine lactones (AHLs), autoinducer-2 (AI-2), and indole influence the biofilm formation of Escherichia coli. Here, we investigate how the environment, i.e., temperature, affects indole and AI-2 signaling in E. coli. We show in biofilms that indole addition leads to more extensive differential gene expression at 30°C (186 genes) than at 37°C (59 genes), that indole reduces biofilm formation (without affecting growth) more significantly at 25°C and 30°C than at 37°C, and that the effect is associated with the quorum-sensing protein SdiA. The addition of indole at 30°C compared to 37°C most significantly repressed genes involved in uridine monophosphate (UMP) biosynthesis (carAB, pyrLBI, pyrC, pyrD pyrF, and upp) and uracil transport (uraA). These uracil-related genes are also repressed at 30°C by SdiA, which confirms SdiA is involved in indole signaling. Also, compared to 37°C, indole more significantly decreased flagella-related qseB, flhD, and fliA promoter activity, enhanced antibiotic resistance, and inhibited cell division at 30°C. In contrast to indole and SdiA, the addition of (S)-4,5-dihydroxy-2,3-pentanedione (the AI-2 precursor) leads to more extensive differential gene expression at 37°C (63 genes) than at 30°C (11 genes), and, rather than repressing UMP synthesis genes, AI-2 induces them at 37°C (but not at 30°C). Also, the addition of AI-2 induces the transcription of virulence genes in enterohemorrhagic E. coli O157:H7 at 37°C but not at 30°C. Hence, cell signals cause diverse responses at different temperatures, and indole- and AI-2-based signaling are intertwined.
Project description:Metabolic cofactors such as NADH and ATP play important roles in a large number of cellular reactions and it is of great interest to dissect the role of these cofactors in different aspects of metabolism. Towards this goal, we overexpressed NADH oxidase and the soluble F1-ATPase in Escherichia coli to lower the level of NADH and ATP, respectively. We used a systems biology approach to study the response to these perturbations by measuring global transcription profiles, metabolic fluxes and the metabolite levels. We integrated information from the different measurements using network-based methods to identify high-scoring networks in a global interaction map that included protein interactions, transcriptional regulation and metabolism. The results revealed that the action of many global transcription factors such as ArcA, Fnr, CRP and IHF commonly involved both NADH and ATP while others were influential only in one of the pertubations. In general, overexpressing NADH oxidase invokes response in widespread aspects of metabolism involving the redox cofactors (NADH and NADPH) while ATPase has a more focused response to restore ATP level by enhancing proton translocation mechanisms and repressing biosynthesis. Interestingly, NADPH played a key role in restoring redox homeostasis through the concerted activity of isocitrate dehydrogenase and UdhA transhydrogenase. We present a reconciled network of regulation that illustrates the overlapping and distinct aspects of metabolism controlled by NADH and ATP. Our study contributes to the general understanding of redox and energy metabolism and should help in developing metabolic engineering strategies in E. coli.
Project description:The rate of differential synthesis of beta-galactosidase (alphalac) was measured in maximally induced cultures of Escherichia coli B/r with 0.01 M-inducer and 0.01 M-cyclic AMP. The value of alphalac decreases with growth rate (60% between 0.67 and 2.1 doublings/h) and after a nutritional shift-up. This decrease is presumed to reflect a decrease in the intracellular concentration of free active RNA polymerase after a shift-up, which implies that the increase in ribosome synthesis after a shift-up is due to an active induction of the ribosomal components.
Project description:Metabolic cofactors such as NADH and ATP play important roles in a large number of cellular reactions and it is of great interest to dissect the role of these cofactors in different aspects of metabolism. Towards this goal, we overexpressed NADH oxidase and the soluble F1-ATPase in Escherichia coli to lower the level of NADH and ATP, respectively. We used a systems biology approach to study the response to these perturbations by measuring global transcription profiles, metabolic fluxes and the metabolite levels. We integrated information from the different measurements using network-based methods to identify high-scoring networks in a global interaction map that included protein interactions, transcriptional regulation and metabolism. The results revealed that the action of many global transcription factors such as ArcA, Fnr, CRP and IHF commonly involved both NADH and ATP while others were influential only in one of the pertubations. In general, overexpressing NADH oxidase invokes response in widespread aspects of metabolism involving the redox cofactors (NADH and NADPH) while ATPase has a more focused response to restore ATP level by enhancing proton translocation mechanisms and repressing biosynthesis. Interestingly, NADPH played a key role in restoring redox homeostasis through the concerted activity of isocitrate dehydrogenase and UdhA transhydrogenase. We present a reconciled network of regulation that illustrates the overlapping and distinct aspects of metabolism controlled by NADH and ATP. Our study contributes to the general understanding of redox and energy metabolism and should help in developing metabolic engineering strategies in E. coli. The experimental design involves measuring transcriptome in three strains (in triplicates) of E. coli during mid-exponential phase of growth on MOPS media supplemented with glucose. The three strains are: 1. REF: MG1655/pAK80 (MG1655 transformed with a plasmid with no insert) 2. NOX: MG1655/pAC06 (MG1655 transformed with a plasmid containing NADH oxidase) 3. ATPase: MG1655/pCP41 (MG1655 transformed with a plasmid containing soluble ATPase) RNA was extracted using Qiagen RNeasy kit and processes according to Affymetrix® guidelines. The quality of RNA was verified using BioAnalyzer (Agilent BioSystems) and the electropherograms are shown in the file âRNA quality.pdfâ. Samples 1-3 are REF, Samples 4-6 are NOX and Samples 7-9 are ATPase. The fragmented cRNA was hybridized to E. coli Genome 2.0 chips.
Project description:Antimicrobial resistance pose a global thread nowadays. Compounds of natural origin are an important source of drugs used in clinical practice. However, it is important to understand both their principles of efficacy and their molecular mechanism of action. In this study we evaluated antimicrobial potential of t-cinnamaldehyde which is an organic compound found in many plant species, especially in the Cinnamomum genus, such as Cinnamomum zeylanicum and cassia. Cinnamon oil extracted from the bark of these plants contains up to 80% trans-cinnamaldehyde. Although CNMA has shown antimicrobial properties against numerous Gram+ and Gram- species, its mode of action against pathogens remains not fuly elucidated. Therefore, this project aims to determine CNMA activity at the level of gene expression. Total RNA was isolated and checked for quality using the Bioanalyzer 2100. The sequencing run was conducted on the Illumina NovaSeq6000 platform. 30 million pair-end reads per samples were assessed with 101 pb read length. Reference E. coli MG1655 genome sequence and annotations were downloaded from GenBank. Differentially expressed analysis of 0.25 x MIC CNMA was performed against untreated control in indicated time with p ≤ 0.001 and log2FC ≥ 1.5. We have discovered many changes bacterial transcriptome. For instance: following the treatment with 0.25×MIC of CNMA, we found 292 and 140 upregulated and 107 and 96 downregulated genes at time points 30 and 60 min, respectively. Among the most enriched genes, were those related to the tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle, flagellum synthesis, amino acid transport, and oxidoreductase activity. According to these findings we can conclude that observed transcriprional pattern indicates severe metabolic downshift in treated cells, and consequently activation of stress processes. These was in line with our secondary experiments which revealed drop in growth kinnetic, cytoplasm shrinkage, NAD/NADH level alteration and elevation of stringent response alarmones ((p)ppGpp). Taken together, this suggests that CNMA-treated E. coli bacteria undergo major metabolic changes that finally result in cell death.
Project description:Treatment failures of antibiotic therapy are of major concern and can be caused by a misalignment of the antibiotic susceptibility determined in vitro with the behaviour of the pathogen in the patient. The aim of this study was to investigate the transcriptomic response of the uropathogenic strain E. coli CFT073 to antibiotic treatment in blood stream infection (BSI) models in order to understand and avoid antibiotic therapy failures in urosepsis treatments. Blood stream infection models were established by growing E. coli CFT073 in pooled human blood with and without ciprofloxacin. The antibiotic challenge was introduced at mid-logarithmic phase of growth of the organism to depict a clinical scenario. The responses were quantified by comparing to the responses at a given time point without the challenge. Global gene expression profiling of these conditions was examined using commercial DNA microarrays. The organism’s metabolic genes appeared to be regulated differently in each medium, this indicated that the bacterial growth regulation were different between the models. Bacterial growth in human serum mainly involved regulations of amino acid synthesis/utilisation such as glycine, arginine, thiamine, regulations of fimbrial proteins and bacteriophage genes. When comparing the responses to antibiotic challenge, bacteria grown in the respective medium displayed specific responses to the antibiotic challenge which were not seen in the other media. The common functions of genes that responded to the ciprofloxacin challenge were SOS response, DNA repair, DNA replication, fimbrial genes and bacteriophage initiation. A subset of the bacteriophage genes showed similar responses between the three models. From genes that were differentially regulated, responses observed in the serum model appeared to have the highest fold changes. In this study we established new models to investigate blood stream infections. They have been used to identify previously unknown differences in the molecular response to antibiotic treatment by the uropathogenic E. coli CFT073 depending on the media. These unique responses will help to unravel the complexity of bloodstream infection and can help to improve the antibiotic therapy that is used.
Project description:Genetic robustness refers to phenotypic invariance in the face of mutation and is a common characteristic of life, but its evolutionary origin is highly controversial. Genetic robustness could be an intrinsic property of biological systems, a result of direct natural selection, or a byproduct of selection for environmental robustness. To differentiate among these hypotheses, we analyze the metabolic network of Escherichia coli and comparable functional random networks. Treating the flux of each reaction as a trait and computationally predicting trait values upon mutations or environmental shifts, we discover that 1) genetic robustness is greater for the actual network than the random networks, 2) the genetic robustness of a trait increases with trait importance and this correlation is stronger in the actual network than in the random networks, and 3) the above result holds even after the control of environmental robustness. These findings demonstrate an adaptive origin of genetic robustness, consistent with the theoretical prediction that, under certain conditions, direct selection is sufficiently powerful to promote genetic robustness in cellular organisms.