Project description:Like other bacterial species, Mycobacterium tuberculosis has multiple sigma (s) factors encoded in its genome. In previously published work, we and others have shown that mutations in some of these transcriptional activators render M. tuberculosis sensitive to various environmental stresses and, in some cases, cause attenuated virulence phenotypes. In this paper, we characterize a M. tuberculosis mutant lacking the ECF s factor sigma-H. This mutant was more sensitive than the wild type to heat shock and to various oxidative stresses, but did not show decreased ability to grow inside macrophages. Using quantitative reverse transcription-PCR and microarray technology, we have started to define the sigma-H regulon and its involvement in the global regulation of the response to heat shock and the thiol-specific oxidizing agent diamide. We identified 48 genes whose expression increased after exposure of M. tuberculosis to diamide; out of these, 39 were not induced in the sigH mutant, showing their direct or indirect dependence on sigma-H. Some of these genes encode proteins whose predicted function is related to thiol metabolism, such as thioredoxin, thioredoxin reductase and enzymes involved in cysteine and molybdopterine biosynthesis. Other genes under sigma-H control encode transcriptional regulators such as sigB, sigE, and sigH itself.
Project description:Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (a.k.a. M. paratuberculosis) causes Johne’s disease, an enteric infection in cattle and other ruminants, greatly afflicting the dairy industry worldwide. Once inside the cell, M. paratuberculosis is known to survive harsh microenvironments, especially those inside activated macrophages. To improve our understanding of M. paratuberculosis pathogenesis, we examined the phagosome maturation associated with transcriptional responses of M. paratuberculosis during macrophage infection. Monitoring cellular markers, only live M. paratuberculosis bacilli were able to prevent phagosome maturation and reduce its acidification. On the transcriptional level, over 300 of M. paratuberculosis genes were significantly, differentially regulated in both naïve and IFN-γ-activated macrophages. These genes include the sigma factor H (sigH) that was shown to be important during persistent infection in M. tuberculosis. Interestingly, a sigH-knockout mutant showed increased sensitivity to a sustained level of thiol-specific oxidative stress. Large-scale RNA sequence analysis revealed that a large number of genes belong to the sigH regulon, especially following diamide stress. Genes involved in oxidative stress and virulence were among the induced genes in the sigH regulon with a putative consensus sequence for SigH binding was recognized in a subset of these genes (N=30), suggesting direct regulation with SigH. Finally, mice infections showed a significant attenuation of the ∆sigH mutant compared to its parental strain suggesting a role for sigH in M. paratuberculosis virulence. Such analysis could identify potential targets for further testing as vaccine candidates against Johne’s disease.
Project description:Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (a.k.a. M. paratuberculosis) causes JohneM-bM-^@M-^Ys disease, an enteric infection in cattle and other ruminants, greatly afflicting the dairy industry worldwide. Once inside the cell, M. paratuberculosis is known to survive harsh microenvironments, especially those inside activated macrophages. To improve our understanding of M. paratuberculosis pathogenesis, we examined the phagosome maturation associated with transcriptional responses of M. paratuberculosis during macrophage infection. Monitoring cellular markers, only live M. paratuberculosis bacilli were able to prevent phagosome maturation and reduce its acidification. On the transcriptional level, over 300 of M. paratuberculosis genes were significantly, differentially regulated in both naM-CM-/ve and IFN-M-NM-3-activated macrophages. These genes include the sigma factor H (sigH) that was shown to be important during persistent infection in M. tuberculosis. Interestingly, a sigH-knockout mutant showed increased sensitivity to a sustained level of thiol-specific oxidative stress. Large-scale RNA sequence analysis revealed that a large number of genes belong to the sigH regulon, especially following diamide stress. Genes involved in oxidative stress and virulence were among the induced genes in the sigH regulon with a putative consensus sequence for SigH binding was recognized in a subset of these genes (N=30), suggesting direct regulation with SigH. Finally, mice infections showed a significant attenuation of the M-bM-^HM-^FsigH mutant compared to its parental strain suggesting a role for sigH in M. paratuberculosis virulence. Such analysis could identify potential targets for further testing as vaccine candidates against JohneM-bM-^@M-^Ys disease. Examination of role played by alternative sigma factor, SigH during M. paratuberculosis infection.
Project description:This SuperSeries is composed of the following subset Series: GSE6209: The global transcriptional profile of Mycobacterium tuberculosis during human macrophages infection GSE7962: Sigma factor E of Mycobacterium tuberculosis controls the expression of bacterial components that modulate macrophages Keywords: SuperSeries Refer to individual Series
Project description:Like other bacterial species, Mycobacterium tuberculosis has multiple sigma (s) factors encoded in its genome. In previously published work, we and others have shown that mutations in some of these transcriptional activators render M. tuberculosis sensitive to various environmental stresses and, in some cases, cause attenuated virulence phenotypes. In this paper, we characterize a M. tuberculosis mutant lacking the ECF s factor sigma-H. This mutant was more sensitive than the wild type to heat shock and to various oxidative stresses, but did not show decreased ability to grow inside macrophages. Using quantitative reverse transcription-PCR and microarray technology, we have started to define the sigma-H regulon and its involvement in the global regulation of the response to heat shock and the thiol-specific oxidizing agent diamide. We identified 48 genes whose expression increased after exposure of M. tuberculosis to diamide; out of these, 39 were not induced in the sigH mutant, showing their direct or indirect dependence on sigma-H. Some of these genes encode proteins whose predicted function is related to thiol metabolism, such as thioredoxin, thioredoxin reductase and enzymes involved in cysteine and molybdopterine biosynthesis. Other genes under sigma-H control encode transcriptional regulators such as sigB, sigE, and sigH itself. Keywords: comparative genome hybridization design and genetic modification design
Project description:Like other bacterial species, Mycobacterium tuberculosis has multiple sigma (s) factors encoded in its genome. In previously published work, we and others have shown that mutations in some of these transcriptional activators render M. tuberculosis sensitive to various environmental stresses and, in some cases, cause attenuated virulence phenotypes. In this paper, we characterize a M. tuberculosis mutant lacking the ECF s factor sigma-H. This mutant was more sensitive than the wild type to heat shock and to various oxidative stresses, but did not show decreased ability to grow inside macrophages. Using quantitative reverse transcription-PCR and microarray technology, we have started to define the sigma-H regulon and its involvement in the global regulation of the response to heat shock and the thiol-specific oxidizing agent diamide. We identified 48 genes whose expression increased after exposure of M. tuberculosis to diamide; out of these, 39 were not induced in the sigH mutant, showing their direct or indirect dependence on sigma-H. Some of these genes encode proteins whose predicted function is related to thiol metabolism, such as thioredoxin, thioredoxin reductase and enzymes involved in cysteine and molybdopterine biosynthesis. Other genes under sigma-H control encode transcriptional regulators such as sigB, sigE, and sigH itself. Keywords: comparative genome hybridization design and genetic modification design 15 samples were analyzed. The quality controls were biological replicate and technical replicate
Project description:Comparison of gene expression profile of the whiB4 mutant strain of Mycobacterium tuberculosis with the wild type Mycobacterium tuberculosis H37RV Mtb WhiB4 mutant mRNA was compared with the mRNA of wtMtb H37RV under aerobic conditons
Project description:This SuperSeries is composed of the following subset Series: GSE36341: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis under aerobic conditions GSE36342: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium smegmatis under aerobic conditions GSE36343: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis during cold and hypoxic stress GSE36344: mRNA degradation in Mycobacterium tuberculosis with DosR ectopically induced Refer to individual Series
Project description:The development of antibiotic tolerance is believed to be a major factor in the lengthy duration of current tuberculosis therapies. In the current study, we have modeled antibiotic tolerance in vitro by exposing Mycobacterium tuberculosis to two distinct stress conditions: progressive hypoxia and nutrient starvation [phosphate-buffered saline (PBS)]. We then studied the bacterial transcriptional response using RNA-seq and employed a bioinformatics approach to identify important transcriptional regulators, which was facilitated by a novel Regulon Enrichment Test (RET). A total of 17 transcription factor (TF) regulons were enriched in the hypoxia gene set and 16 regulons were enriched in the nutrient starvation, with 12 regulons enriched in both conditions. Using the same approach to analyze previously published gene expression datasets, we found that three M. tuberculosis regulons (Rv0023, SigH, and Crp) were commonly induced in both stress conditions and were also among the regulons enriched in our data. These regulators are worthy of further study to determine their potential role in the development and maintenance of antibiotic tolerance in M. tuberculosis following stress exposure.
Project description:In previously published work, we identified three Mycobacterium tuberculosis sigma (s) factor genes responding to heat shock (sigB, sigE and sigH ). Two of them (sigB and sigE ) also responded to SDS exposure. As these responses to stress suggested that the s factors encoded by these genes could be involved in pathogenicity, we are studying their role in physiology and virulence. In this work, we characterize a sigE mutant of M. tuberculosis H37Rv. The sigE mutant strain was more sensitive than the wild-type strain to heat shock, SDS and various oxidative stresses. It was also defective in the ability to grow inside both human and murine unactivated macrophages and was more sensitive than the wild-type strain to the killing activity of activated murine macrophages. Using microarray technology and quantitative reverse transcriptionÐpolymerase chain reaction (RTÐPCR), we started to define the sigmaE regulon of M. tuberculosis and its involvement in the global regulation of the stress induced by SDS. We showed the requirement for a functional sigE gene for full expression of sigB and for its induction after SDS exposure but not after heat shock. We also identified several genes that are no longer induced when sigmaE is absent. These genes encode proteins belonging to different classes including transcriptional regulators, enzymes involved in fatty acid degradation and classical heat shock proteins.