Random sorting of Campylobacter jejuni phase variants due to a narrow bottleneck during colonization of broiler chickens.

ABSTRACT: Phase variation (PV), involving stochastic switches in gene expression, is exploited by the human pathogen Campylobacter jejuni to adapt to different environmental and host niches. Phase-variable genes of C. jejuni modulate expression of multiple surface determinants, and hence may influence host colonization. Population bottlenecks can rapidly remove the diversity generated by PV, and strict single-cell bottlenecks can lead to propagation of PV states with highly divergent phenotypes. Using a combination of high-throughput fragment size analysis and comparison with in vivo and in silico bottleneck models, we have characterized a narrow population bottleneck during the experimental colonization of broiler chickens with C. jejuni strain 81-176. We identified high levels of variation in five

SUBMITTER: Wanford JJ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6097035 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Jun

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature