Control of gene expression at a bacterial leader RNA, the agn43 gene encoding outer membrane protein Ag43 of Escherichia coli.

ABSTRACT: The family of agn alleles in Escherichia coli pathovars encodes autotransporters that have been implicated in biofilm formation, autoaggregation, and attachment to cells. The alleles all have long leader RNAs preceding the Ag43 translation initiation codon. Here we present an analysis of the agn43 leader RNA from E. coli K-12. We demonstrate the presence of a rho-independent transcription terminator just 28 bp upstream of the main translation start codon and show that it is functional in vitro. Our data indicate that an as-yet-unknown mechanism of antitermination of transcription must be operative in earlier phases of growth. However, as bacterial cell cultures mature, progressively fewer transcripts are able to bypass this terminator. In the K-12 leader sequence, two in-frame translation

SUBMITTER: Wallecha A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4135670 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature