Stock culture heterogeneity rather than new mutational variation complicates short-term cell physiology studies of Escherichia coli K-12 MG1655 in continuous culture.

ABSTRACT: Nutrient-limited continuous cultures in chemostats have been used to study microbial cell physiology for over 60 years. Genome instability and genetic heterogeneity are possible uncontrolled factors in continuous cultivation experiments. We investigated these issues by using high-throughput (HT) DNA sequencing to characterize samples from different phases of a glucose-limited accelerostat (A-stat) experiment with Escherichia coli K-12 MG1655 and a duration regularly used in cell physiology studies (20 generations of continuous cultivation). Seven consensus mutations from the reference sequence and five subpopulations characterized by different mutations were detected in the HT-sequenced samples. This genetic heterogeneity was confirmed to result from the stock culture by Sanger sequencing.

SUBMITTER: Nahku R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3352173 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature