Each Caulobacter cell division yields daughter cells that differ from one another both structurally and functionally. By focusing on the biogenesis of the polar flagellum and the proteins of the chemosensory system, several laboratories have now defined an extensive network of genes whose temporal expression is controlled in the predivisional cell. The differential turn-on of these genes contributes to the generation of asymmetry in the predivisional cell in that the products of these genes are targeted to specific cellular locations. To define the mechanisms that mediate this temporal and spatial control, fla genes whose products are not known were accessed by the insertion of transposon-carried drug resistance markers. The transposons were altered so that upon insertion into the chromosome, transcription fusions are formed in which the promoter regions of fla genes drive the expression of the downstream promoter-less drug resistance genes. Assays of the differential placement of the promoter-less drug resistance proteins (encoded within the interrupted fla genes) allow us to determine whether the positioning of the fla gene products is controlled by signal sequences in their proteins, by specific mRNA-targeting sequences in the 5'-regulatory regions of these genes, or by specific transcription from only one of the two newly replicated chromosomes in the predivisional cell.
Download full-text PDF |
Source |
|---|---|
| http://dx.doi.org/10.1101/sqb.1985.050.01.101 | DOI Listing |
Publication Analysis
Top Keywords
Similar Publications
Coupling of cell growth modulation to asymmetric division and cell cycle regulation in .
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A
October 2024
Department of Biology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305.
In proliferating bacteria, growth rate is often assumed to be similar between daughter cells. However, most of our knowledge of cell growth derives from studies on symmetrically dividing bacteria. In many α-proteobacteria, asymmetric division is a normal part of the life cycle, with each division producing daughter cells with different sizes and fates.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFUpstream CtrA-binding sites both induce and repress pilin gene expression in Caulobacter crescentus.
BMC Genomics
July 2024
Department of Biology, University of Mississippi, University, 402 Shoemaker Hall, Oxford, MS, 38677, USA.
Pili are bacterial surface structures important for surface adhesion. In the alphaproteobacterium Caulobacter crescentus, the global regulator CtrA activates transcription of roughly 100 genes, including pilA which codes for the pilin monomer that makes up the pilus filament. While most CtrA-activated promoters have a single CtrA-binding site at the - 35 position and are induced at the early to mid-predivisional cell stage, the pilA promoter has 3 additional upstream CtrA-binding sites and it is induced at the late predivisional cell stage.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFScaffold-Scaffold Interaction Facilitates Cell Polarity Development in Caulobacter crescentus.
mBio
April 2023
CAS Key Laboratory of Quantitative Engineering Biology, Shenzhen Institute of Synthetic Biology, Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen, China.
Cell polarity development is the prerequisite for cell differentiation and generating biodiversity. In the model bacterium Caulobacter crescentus, the polarization of the scaffold protein PopZ during the predivisional cell stage plays a central role in asymmetric cell division. However, our understanding of the spatiotemporal regulation of PopZ localization remains incomplete.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBacteria-on-a-bead: probing the hydrodynamic interplay of dynamic cell appendages during cell separation.
Commun Biol
October 2022
Institute of Physics, University of Freiburg, 79104, Freiburg, Germany.
Surface attachment of bacteria is the first step of biofilm formation and is often mediated and coordinated by the extracellular appendages, flagellum and pili. The model organism Caulobacter crescentus undergoes an asymmetric division cycle, giving rise to a motile "swarmer cell" and a sessile "stalked cell", which is attached to the surface. In the highly polarized predivisional cell, pili and flagellum, which are assembled at the pole opposite the stalk, are both activated before and during the process of cell separation.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA localized adaptor protein performs distinct functions at the cell poles.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A
March 2021
Department of Developmental Biology, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA 94305;
Asymmetric cell division generates two daughter cells with distinct characteristics and fates. Positioning different regulatory and signaling proteins at the opposing ends of the predivisional cell produces molecularly distinct daughter cells. Here, we report a strategy deployed by the asymmetrically dividing bacterium where a regulatory protein is programmed to perform distinct functions at the opposing cell poles.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWant AI Summaries of new PubMed Abstracts delivered to your In-box?
Enter search terms and have AI summaries delivered each week - change queries or unsubscribe any time!