Transcription and Translation Products of the Cytolysin Gene psm-mec on the Mobile Genetic Element SCCmec Regulate Staphylococcus aureus Virulence

PLoS Pathogens

Teruyo Ito¹  Keiichi Hiramatsu¹  Xiao Han¹  Kyoko Kuwahara-Arai¹  Tadashi Baba¹  Tomomi Hishinuma¹  Yuki Saito²  Yosuke Omae²  Mariko Ikuo²  Kazuhisa Sekimizu²  Gentaro Nagano²  Chikara Kaito²  Yuichi Hanada² 

[1] Department of Infection Control Science, Graduate School of Medicine, Juntendo University, Tokyo, Japan;Laboratory of Microbiology, Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan

关键词: Gene prediction;    Staphylococcus aureus;    Bacterial biofilms;    Biofilms;    Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus;    Operons;    Messenger RNA;    DNA transcription;   

DOI  :  10.1371/journal.ppat.1001267

学科分类：生物科学（综合）

来源: Public Library of Science

【 摘 要 】

The F region downstream of the mecI gene in the SCCmec element in hospital-associated methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (HA-MRSA) contains two bidirectionally overlapping open reading frames (ORFs), the fudoh ORF and the psm-mec ORF. The psm-mec ORF encodes a cytolysin, phenol-soluble modulin (PSM)-mec. Transformation of the F region into the Newman strain, which is a methicillin-sensitive S. aureus (MSSA) strain, or into the MW2 (USA400) and FRP3757 (USA300) strains, which are community-acquired MRSA (CA-MRSA) strains that lack the F region, attenuated their virulence in a mouse systemic infection model. Introducing the F region to these strains suppressed colony-spreading activity and PSMα production, and promoted biofilm formation. By producing mutations into the psm-mec ORF, we revealed that (i) both the transcription and translation products of the psm-mec ORF suppressed colony-spreading activity and promoted biofilm formation; and (ii) the transcription product of the psm-mec ORF, but not its translation product, decreased PSMα production. These findings suggest that both the psm-mec transcript, acting as a regulatory RNA, and the PSM-mec protein encoded by the gene on the mobile genetic element SCCmec regulate the virulence of Staphylococcus aureus.

【 授权许可】

CC BY