English
 
Help Privacy Policy Disclaimer
  Advanced SearchBrowse

Item

ITEM ACTIONSEXPORT

Released

Preprint

Regulation by cyclic-di-GMP attenuates dynamics and enhances robustness of bimodal curli gene activation in Escherichia coli

MPS-Authors
/persons/resource/persons263966

Lamprecht,  Olga
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons269075

Ratnikava,  Maryia
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons267041

Jacek,  Paulina
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons269125

Kaganovitch,  Eugen
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

Buettner,  Nina
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons281928

Fritz,  Kirstin
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons281926

Biazruchka,  Ina
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons267063

Köhler,  Robin Clemens
Research Group Mechanisms of Spatial-Organisation, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons269114

Pietsch,  Julian
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;

/persons/resource/persons254726

Sourjik,  Victor       
Microbial Networks, Department of Systems and Synthetic Microbiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Max Planck Society;
Center for Synthetic Microbiology (SYNMIKRO), Philipps-Universität Marburg;

External Resource
Fulltext (restricted access)
There are currently no full texts shared for your IP range.
Fulltext (public)
There are no public fulltexts stored in PuRe
Supplementary Material (public)
There is no public supplementary material available
Citation

Lamprecht, O., Ratnikava, M., Jacek, P., Kaganovitch, E., Buettner, N., Fritz, K., et al. (2022). Regulation by cyclic-di-GMP attenuates dynamics and enhances robustness of bimodal curli gene activation in Escherichia coli. bioRxiv: the preprint server for biology, 2022.05.23.493020.


Cite as: https://hdl.handle.net/21.11116/0000-000B-4DB2-6
Abstract
Curli amyloid fibers are a major constituent of the extracellular biofilm matrix formed by bacteria of the Enterobacteriaceae family. Within Escherichia coli biofilms, curli gene expression is limited to a subpopulation of bacteria, leading to heterogeneity of extracellular matrix synthesis. Here we show that bimodal activation of curli expression occurs not only in submerged and macrocolony biofilms, but also in well-mixed planktonic cultures of E. coli, resulting in all-or-none stochastic differentiation into distinct subpopulations of curli-positive and curli-negative cells at the entry into the stationary phase of growth. Stochastic curli activation in individual E. coli cells could further be observed during continuous growth in a conditioned medium in a microfluidic device, which further revealed that the curli-positive state is only metastable. In agreement with previous reports, regulation of curli gene expression by c-di-GMP via two pairs of diguanylate cyclase and phosphodiesterase enzymes, DgcE/PdeH and DgcM/PdeR, modulates the fraction of curli-positive cells under all tested growth conditions. Unexpectedly, removal of this regulatory network does not abolish the bimodality of curli gene expression, although it affects dynamics of activation and increases heterogeneity of expression levels among individual cells. Moreover, the fraction of curli-positive cells within an E. coli population shows stronger dependence on growth conditions in the absence of c-di-GMP regulation. We thus conclude that, while not required for the emergence of bimodal curli gene expression in E. coli, this c-di-GMP regulatory network attenuates the frequency and dynamics of gene activation and increases its robustness to cellular heterogeneity and environmental variation.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.