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Phage-encoded sigma factors alter bacterial dormancy

DA Schwartz, BK Lehmkuhl, View ORCID ProfileJT Lennon
doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.11.12.468384
DA Schwartz
Department of Biology, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA
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  • For correspondence: danschw@iu.edu lennonj@iu.edu
BK Lehmkuhl
Department of Biology, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA
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JT Lennon
Department of Biology, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47405, USA
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  • For correspondence: danschw@iu.edu lennonj@iu.edu
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ABSTRACT

By entering a reversible state of reduced metabolic activity, dormant microorganisms are able to tolerate suboptimal conditions that would otherwise reduce their fitness. Dormancy may also benefit bacteria by serving as a refuge from parasitic infections. Here we focus on dormancy in the Firmicutes, where endospore development is transcriptionally regulated by the expression of sigma factors. A disruption of this process could influence the survivorship and reproduction of phages that infect spore-forming hosts with implications for coevolutionary dynamics. Here, we characterized the distribution and diversity of sigma factors in nearly 3,500 phage genomes. Homologs of sporulation-specific sigma factors were identified in phages that infect spore-forming hosts. Unlike sigma factors required for phage reproduction, the sporulation-like sigma factors were non-essential for lytic infection. However, when expressed in the spore-forming Bacillus subtilis, sigma factors from phages activated the bacterial sporulation gene network and reduced spore yield. Our findings suggest that the acquisition of host-like transcriptional regulators may allow phages to manipulate a complex and ancient trait in one of the most abundant cell types on Earth.

Competing Interest Statement

The authors have declared no competing interest.

Footnotes

  • https://github.com/LennonLab/sigma-spore-phage

Copyright 
The copyright holder for this preprint is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under a CC-BY 4.0 International license.
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Posted November 12, 2021.
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Phage-encoded sigma factors alter bacterial dormancy
DA Schwartz, BK Lehmkuhl, JT Lennon
bioRxiv 2021.11.12.468384; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.11.12.468384
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Phage-encoded sigma factors alter bacterial dormancy
DA Schwartz, BK Lehmkuhl, JT Lennon
bioRxiv 2021.11.12.468384; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.11.12.468384

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