Low salinity activates a virulence program in the generalist marine pathogen Photobacterium damselae subsp. damselae.

ABSTRACT: Facultative marine bacterial pathogens sense environmental signals so that the expression of virulence factors is upregulated on entry into hosts and downregulated during the free-living lifestyle in the environment. In this study, we utilized transcriptome sequencing to compare the transcriptional profiles of Photobacterium damselae subsp. damselae, a generalist pathogen that causes disease in diverse marine animals and fatal infections in humans at NaCl concentrations that mimic the free-living lifestyle or host internal milieu, respectively. We here show that NaCl concentration constitutes a major regulatory signal that shapes the transcriptome and uncover 1,808 differentially expressed genes (888 upregulated and 920 downregulated in response to low-salt conditions). Growt

SUBMITTER: Barca AV 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10308900 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature