Title
Transcriptional activity around bacterial cell death reveals molecular biomarkers for cell viability
Author
TNO Kwaliteit van Leven
Kort, R.
Keijser, B.J.
Caspers, M.P.M.
Schuren, F.H.
Montijn, R.
Publication year
2008
Abstract
Background: In bacteriology, the ability to grow in selective media and to form colonies on nutrient agar plates is routinely used as a retrospective criterion for the detection of living bacteria. However, the utilization of indicators for bacterial viability-such as the presence of specific transcripts or membrane integrity-would overcome bias introduced by cultivation and reduces the time span of analysis from initiation to read out. Therefore, we investigated the correlation between transcriptional activity, membrane integrity and cultivation-based viability in the Gram-positive model bacterium Bacillus subtilis. Results: We present microbiological, cytological and molecular analyses of the physiological response to lethal heat stress under accurately defined conditions through systematic sampling of bacteria from a single culture exposed to gradually increasing temperatures. We identified a coherent transcriptional program including known heat shock responses as well as the rapid expression of a small number of sporulation and competence genes, the latter only known to be active in the stationary growth phase. Conclusion: The observed coordinated gene expression continued even after cell death, in other words after all bacteria permanently lost their ability to reproduce. Transcription of a very limited number of genes correlated with cell viability under the applied killing regime. The transcripts of the expressed genes in living bacteria - but silent in dead bacteria-include those of essential genes encoding chaperones of the protein folding machinery and can serve as molecular biomarkers for bacterial cell viability. © 2008 Kort et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. Chemicals / CAS: Biological Markers; RNA, Bacterial
Subject
Biotechnology
Bacterial RNA
Ribosome RNA
Biological marker
Article
Bacillus subtilis
Bacterial cell
Bacterial growth
Bacterial membrane
Bacterial reproduction
Cell culture
Cell death
Cell viability
Cellular stress response
Controlled study
Cytology
Gene cluster
Gene expression
Genetic transcription
Growth curve
Heat stress
Nonhuman
Protein folding
RNA stability
Sporogenesis
Transcription regulation
Bacterial count
DNA microarray
Gene expression profiling
Gene expression regulation
Genetics
Growth, development and aging
Heat
Heat shock response
Microbial viability
Multigene family
Physiology
Transcription initiation
Bacillus subtilis
Bacteria (microorganisms)
Posibacteria
Bacillus subtilis
Biological Markers
Colony Count, Microbial
Gene Expression Profiling
Gene Expression Regulation, Bacterial
Heat-Shock Response
Hot Temperature
Microbial Viability
Multigene Family
Oligonucleotide Array Sequence Analysis
RNA Stability
RNA, Bacterial
Transcription, Genetic
Transcriptional Activation
To reference this document use:
http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:4f68e501-c848-4e07-82c1-0523be8b1749
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2164-9-590
TNO identifier
241277
ISSN
1471-2164
Source
BMC Genomics, 9 (9)
Document type
article