Polkade Ashish V, Mantri Shailesh S, Patwekar Umera J, Jangid Kamlesh
Microbial Culture Collection, National Centre for Cell Science, Savitribai Phule Pune University Campus Pune, India.
Front Microbiol. 2016 Feb 10;7:131. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2016.00131. eCollection 2016.
Quorum sensing is known to play a major role in the regulation of secondary metabolite production, especially, antibiotics, and morphogenesis in the phylum Actinobacteria. Although it is one of the largest bacterial phylum, only 25 of the 342 genera have been reported to use quorum sensing. Of these, only nine have accompanying experimental evidence; the rest are only known through bioinformatic analysis of gene/genome sequences. It is evident that this important communication mechanism is not extensively explored in Actinobacteria. In this review, we summarize the different quorum sensing systems while identifying the limitations of the existing screening strategies and addressing the improvements that have taken place in this field in recent years. The γ-butyrolactone system turned out to be almost exclusively limited to this phylum. In addition, methylenomycin furans, AI-2 and other putative AHL-like signaling molecules are also reported in Actinobacteria. The lack of existing screening systems in detecting minute quantities and of a wider range of signaling molecules was a major reason behind the limited information available on quorum sensing in this phylum. However, recent improvements in screening strategies hold a promising future and are likely to increase the discovery of new signaling molecules. Further, the quorum quenching ability in many Actinobacteria has a great potential in controlling the spread of plant and animal pathogens. A systematic and coordinated effort is required to screen and exploit the enormous potential that quorum sensing in the phylum Actinobacteria has to offer for human benefit.
群体感应在放线菌门中次生代谢产物（尤其是抗生素）的产生调控及形态发生过程中发挥着重要作用。尽管放线菌门是最大的细菌门类之一，但在342个属中，仅有25个属被报道使用群体感应。其中，只有9个属有相应的实验证据；其余的仅通过基因/基因组序列的生物信息学分析得知。显然，这种重要的通讯机制在放线菌中尚未得到广泛研究。在本综述中，我们总结了不同的群体感应系统，同时指出了现有筛选策略的局限性，并阐述了近年来该领域取得的进展。γ-丁内酯系统几乎仅局限于这一门类。此外，在放线菌中还报道了亚甲基霉素呋喃、AI-2及其他假定的类AHL信号分子。现有筛选系统在检测微量及更广泛的信号分子方面的不足，是该门类中群体感应相关信息有限的主要原因。然而，筛选策略的近期改进前景广阔，可能会增加新信号分子的发现。此外，许多放线菌中的群体淬灭能力在控制动植物病原体传播方面具有巨大潜力。需要进行系统且协调的努力，以筛选和利用放线菌门中群体感应为人类带来的巨大潜力。
