Analysis of the intact surface layer of Caulobacter crescentus by cryo-electron tomography.

ABSTRACT: The surface layers (S layers) of those bacteria and archaea that elaborate these crystalline structures have been studied for 40 years. However, most structural analysis has been based on electron microscopy of negatively stained S-layer fragments separated from cells, which can introduce staining artifacts and allow rearrangement of structures prone to self-assemble. We present a quantitative analysis of the structure and organization of the S layer on intact growing cells of the Gram-negative bacterium Caulobacter crescentus using cryo-electron tomography (CET) and statistical image processing. Instead of the expected long-range order, we observed different regions with hexagonally organized subunits exhibiting short-range order and a broad distribution of periodicities. Also, areas of s

SUBMITTER: Amat F 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2976456 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature