The early response to acid shock in Lactobacillus reuteri involves the ClpL chaperone and a putative cell wall-altering esterase.

ABSTRACT: To be able to function as a probiotic, bacteria have to survive the passage through the gastrointestinal tract. We have examined survival and gene expression of Lactobacillus reuteri ATCC 55730 after a sudden shift in environmental acidity to a pH close to the conditions in the human stomach. More than 80% of the L. reuteri cells survived at pH 2.7 for 1 h. A genomewide expression analysis experiment using microarrays displayed 72 differentially expressed genes at this pH. The early response to severe acid shock in L. reuteri differed from long-term acid adaptation to milder acid stress studied in other lactic acid bacteria. The genes induced included the following: clpL, genes putatively involved in alterations of the cell membrane and the cell wall; genes encoding transcriptional regulat

SUBMITTER: Wall T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1932720 | biostudies-literature | 2007 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature