The Bacillus anthracis chromosome contains four conserved, excision-proficient, putative prophages.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Bacillus anthracis is considered to be a recently emerged clone within the Bacillus cereus sensu lato group. The B. anthracis genome sequence contains four putative lambdoid prophages. We undertook this study in order to understand whether the four prophages are unique to B. anthracis and whether they produce active phages.

Results

More than 300 geographically and temporally divergent isolates of B. anthracis and its near neighbors were screened by PCR for the presence of specific DNA sequences from each prophage region. Every isolate of B. anthracis screened by PCR was found to produce all four phage-specific amplicons whereas none of the non-B. anthracis isolates, produced more than one phage-specific amplicon. Excision of prophages could be detected by a PCR ba

SUBMITTER: Sozhamannan S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1475869 | biostudies-literature | 2006 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature