Metabolomics,Unknown,Transcriptomics,Genomics,Proteomics

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Global post-transcriptional control of genes involved in amino acid metabolism by the Hfq-dependent GcvB RNA

ABSTRACT: The control of amino acid synthesis and transport in bacteria has been well-investigated at the transcriptional level. The discovery of a small Hfq-dependent regulatory RNA, GcvB, added another layer of gene expression control at the post-transcriptional level. GcvB RNA has been shown to directly regulate multiple ABC transporters for amino acids in E. coli and Salmonella using a highly conserved G/U-rich domain, R1. To identify additional GcvB targets, we have combined a sRNA pulse-expression and microarray analysis of whole transcriptome changes with biocomputational target searches for C/A- rich target sites in Salmonella. Moreover, we have included GcvB mutant RNAs in our microarray approach providing a new target search approach by inactivating conserved domains or target interaction sites. This dual approach revealed further amino acid transporters and, in addition, genes involved in amino acid metabolism as consensus R1-dependent GcvB targets. Moreover, GcvB RNA seems to bind with at least two binding sites to an R1-independent target, the glycine transporter cycA. Using GFP reporter gene fusions we have now validated 21 GcvB targets which is best to our knowledge with ~1% of all Salmonella protein coding genes, the largest bacterial sRNA-controlled regulon. Intriguingly, GcvB rewires many primary control circuits and, thus, constitutes an important metabolic knot. To predict direct GcvB targets with better confidence, we expanded the sRNA pulse-expression approach to assay effects of several versions of GcvB sRNA. We cloned GcvB wild-type and mutants RNAs deleted for the conserved regions R1 or R2 (Fig. 1A) under control of an arabinose-inducible PBAD promoter, yielding plasmid pBAD-GcvB (pKP1-1), pBAD-GcvB delta R1 (pKP2-6) and pBAD-GcvB delta R2 (pKP30-1). For confirmation of inducible expression, Salmonella wild-type carrying pBAD control vector (pKP8-35), and Salmonella ΔgcvB carrying either control vector (Ctr) or the above GcvB expression plasmids were grown to mid-exponential phase (OD600 of 1) and treated with L-arabinose for up to 15 min. We used whole-genome S. typhimurium microarrays to determine relative mRNA expression changes at 10 min of induction, comparing the mRNA profiles of the pBAD-GcvB, pBAD-GcvB delta R1 or pBAD-GcvB delta R2 strains to that of the delta gcvB deletion mutant strain carrying the control vector. Microarrays used in this study were produced by in-situ synthesis as 8x15k multipack format from Agilent Technologies. Each microarray comprises 13268 60-mer S. typhimurium strain SL1344 specific oligonucleotides supplemented with 319 60-mer S. enterica subsp. serovar Typhimurium 14028S specific oligonucleotides, 360 60-mer S. typhimurium LT2 specific oligonucleotides and 360 60-mer oligonucleotides specific for 149 Salmonella sRNAs. The experimental design involves the use of Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium genomic DNA as the co-hybridized control for one channel on all microarrays. Two independent biological eperiments were analyzed.

ORGANISM(S): Salmonella enterica subsp. enterica serovar Typhimurium str. SL1344

SUBMITTER: Hans-Joachim Mollenkopf

PROVIDER: E-GEOD-26573 | biostudies-arrayexpress |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-arrayexpress

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Project description:SgrS RNA is a model for the large class of Hfq-associated small RNAs that act to post-transcriptionally regulate bacterial mRNAs. The function of SgrS is well-characterized in non-pathogenic Escherichia coli where it was originally shown to counteract glucose-phosphate stress by acting as a repressor of ptsG mRNA which encodes the major glucose transporter. We have discovered new SgrS targets in Salmonella Typhimurium, a pathogen related to E. coli, which recently acquired a quarter of all genes by horizontal gene transfer. We demonstrate that the conserved short seed region of SgrS that recognizes ptsG was recruited to target the Salmonella-specific sopD mRNA of a secreted virulence protein. The SgrS-sopD interaction is exceptionally selective; we find that sopD2 mRNA whose gene arose from sopD duplication during Salmonella evolution, is deaf to SgrS owing to a non-productive G:U pair in the potential SgrS-sopD2 RNA duplex versus G:C in SgrS-sopD. In other words, SgrS discriminates the two virulence factor mRNAs at the level of a single hydrogen bond. Our study suggests that bacterial pathogens employ their large suites of conserved Hfq-associated regulators to integrate horizontally acquired genes into existing post-transcriptional networks, just as conserved transcription factors are recruited to tame foreign genes at the DNA level. The results graphically illustrate the importance of the seed regions of bacterial small RNAs to select new targets with high fidelity, and argue that target predictions must consider all-or-none decisions by individual seed nucleotides. To determine the targets of the small regulatory RNA SgrS in S. Typhimurium, we looked at the effect of a short pulse of SgrS over-expression on the Salmonella transcriptome. To achieve over-expression, the sgrS gene was cloned in the pBAD plasmid and induced with 0.2% L-arabinose for 10 min. We then extracted the total RNA for transcriptional profiling. A strain carrying the pBAD plasmid w/o insert was used as negative control. 3 biological replicates were performed. This sRNA target identification strategy has been described in Papenfort et al; Molecular Microbiology (2006) 62(6), 1674–1688.

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Global post-transcriptional control of genes involved in amino acid metabolism by the Hfq-dependent GcvB RNA

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