Potential Whole-Cell Biosensors for Detection of Metal Using MerR Family Proteins from sp. YSU and OR02.

Cell-based biosensors harness a cell's ability to respond to the environment by repurposing its sensing mechanisms. MerR family proteins are activator/repressor switches that regulate the expression of bacterial metal resistance genes and have been used in metal biosensors. Upon metal binding, a conformational change switches gene expression from off to on.

Identification of peptide sequences that selectively bind to pentaerythritol trinitrate hemisuccinate-a surrogate of PETN, via phage display technology.

The present research investigates the identification of amino acid sequences that selectively bind to a pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN) explosive surrogate. Through the use of a phage display technique and enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA), a peptide library was tested against pentaerythritol trinitrate hemisuccinate (PETNH), a surrogate of PETN, to screen for those with amino acids having affinity toward the explosive. The results suggest that the library contains peptides selective to PETNH.

Generation of Enterobacter sp. YSU auxotrophs using transposon mutagenesis.

Prototrophic bacteria grow on M-9 minimal salts medium supplemented with glucose (M-9 medium), which is used as a carbon and energy source. Auxotrophs can be generated using a transposome. The commercially available, Tn5-derived transposome used in this protocol consists of a linear segment of DNA containing an R6Kγ replication origin, a gene for kanamycin resistance and two mosaic sequence ends, which serve as transposase binding sites.

Proteomic profiling of L-cysteine induced selenite resistance in Enterobacter sp. YSU.

Background: Enterobacter sp. YSU is resistant to several different heavy metal salts, including selenite. A previous study using M-9 minimal medium showed that when the selenite concentration was 100,000 times higher than the sulfate concentration, selenite entered Escherichia coli cells using two pathways: a specific and a non-specific pathway.

Comparison of two multimetal resistant bacterial strains: Enterobacter sp. YSU and Stenotrophomonas maltophilia ORO2.

The Y-12 plant in Oak Ridge, TN, which manufactured nuclear weapons during World War II and the Cold War, contaminated East Fork Poplar Creek with heavy metals. The multimetal resistant bacterial strain, Stenotrophomonas maltophilia Oak Ridge strain O2 (S. maltophilia O2), was isolated from East Fork Poplar Creek.

Engineered single-chain, antiparallel, coiled coil mimics the MerR metal binding site.

The repressor-activator MerR that controls transcription of the mercury resistance (mer) operon is unusual for its high sensitivity and specificity for Hg(II) in in vivo and in vitro transcriptional assays. The metal-recognition domain of MerR resides at the homodimer interface in a novel antiparallel arrangement of alpha-helix 5 that forms a coiled-coil motif. To facilitate the study of this novel metal binding motif, we assembled this antiparallel coiled coil into a single chain by directly fusing two copies of the 48-residue alpha-helix 5 of MerR.