Tang Xiaoyu, Yang Zhen, Dai Ke, Liu Geyan, Chang Yung-Fu, Tang Xinwei, Wang Kang, Zhang Yiwen, Hu Bangdi, Cao Sanjie, Huang Xiaobo, Yan Qigui, Wu Rui, Zhao Qin, Du Senyan, Lang Yifei, Han Xinfeng, Huang Yong, Wen Xintian, Wen Yiping
Research Center of Swine Disease, College of Veterinary Medicine, Sichuan Agricultural University, Chengdu, China.
Department of Population Medicine and Diagnostic Sciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, United States.
Front Microbiol. 2022 Jul 29;13:948633. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2022.948633. eCollection 2022.
Natural transformation is a mechanism by which a particular bacterial species takes up foreign DNA and integrates it into its genome. The swine pathogen () is a naturally transformable bacterium. The regulation of competence, however, is not fully understood. In this study, the natural transformability of 99 strains was investigated. Only 44% of the strains were transformable under laboratory conditions. Through a high-resolution melting curve and phylogenetic analysis, we found that genetic differences in the core regulator of natural transformation, the gene, leads to two distinct natural transformation phenotypes. In the absence of the gene, the highly transformable strain SC1401 lost its natural transformability. In addition, when the SC1401 gene was replaced by the of SH0165, which has no natural transformability, competence was also lost. These results suggest that TfoX is a core regulator of natural transformation in , and that differences in can be used as a molecular indicator of natural transformability. Transcriptomic and proteomic analyses of the SC1401 wildtype strain, and a gene deletion strain showed that differential gene expression and protein synthesis is mainly centered on pathways related to glucose metabolism. The results suggest that may mediate natural transformation by regulating the metabolism of carbon sources. Our study provides evidence that plays an important role in the natural transformation of .
自然转化是一种特定细菌物种摄取外源DNA并将其整合到基因组中的机制。猪病原体（）是一种可自然转化的细菌。然而，感受态的调控尚未完全了解。在本研究中，对99株菌株的自然转化能力进行了研究。在实验室条件下，只有44%的菌株具有可转化性。通过高分辨率熔解曲线和系统发育分析，我们发现自然转化核心调节因子基因的遗传差异导致了两种不同的自然转化表型。在没有基因的情况下，高可转化菌株SC1401失去了其自然转化能力。此外，当SC1401基因被无可自然转化能力的SH0165的基因取代时，感受态也丧失了。这些结果表明，TfoX是自然转化的核心调节因子，并且基因的差异可用作自然转化能力的分子指标。对SC1401野生型菌株和基因缺失菌株的转录组学和蛋白质组学分析表明，差异基因表达和蛋白质合成主要集中在与葡萄糖代谢相关的途径上。结果表明，可能通过调节碳源代谢来介导自然转化。我们的研究提供了证据，表明在自然转化中起重要作用。
