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Otto SB, Servajean R, Lemopoulos A, Bitbol AF, Blokesch M. Interactions between pili affect the outcome of bacterial competition driven by the type VI secretion system. Curr Biol 2024; 34:2403-2417.e9. [PMID: 38749426 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2024.04.041] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/26/2023] [Revised: 04/09/2024] [Accepted: 04/22/2024] [Indexed: 06/06/2024]
Abstract
The bacterial type VI secretion system (T6SS) is a widespread, kin-discriminatory weapon capable of shaping microbial communities. Due to the system's dependency on contact, cellular interactions can lead to either competition or kin protection. Cell-to-cell contact is often accomplished via surface-exposed type IV pili (T4Ps). In Vibrio cholerae, these T4Ps facilitate specific interactions when the bacteria colonize natural chitinous surfaces. However, it has remained unclear whether and, if so, how these interactions affect the bacterium's T6SS-mediated killing. In this study, we demonstrate that pilus-mediated interactions can be harnessed by T6SS-equipped V. cholerae to kill non-kin cells under liquid growth conditions. We also show that the naturally occurring diversity of pili determines the likelihood of cell-to-cell contact and, consequently, the extent of T6SS-mediated competition. To determine the factors that enable or hinder the T6SS's targeted reduction of competitors carrying pili, we developed a physics-grounded computational model for autoaggregation. Collectively, our research demonstrates that T4Ps involved in cell-to-cell contact can impose a selective burden when V. cholerae encounters non-kin cells that possess an active T6SS. Additionally, our study underscores the significance of T4P diversity in protecting closely related individuals from T6SS attacks through autoaggregation and spatial segregation.
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Affiliation(s)
- Simon B Otto
- Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology, Global Health Institute, School of Life Sciences, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Richard Servajean
- Laboratory of Computational Biology and Theoretical Biophysics, Institute of Bioengineering, School of Life Sciences, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland; SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Alexandre Lemopoulos
- Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology, Global Health Institute, School of Life Sciences, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Anne-Florence Bitbol
- Laboratory of Computational Biology and Theoretical Biophysics, Institute of Bioengineering, School of Life Sciences, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland; SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
| | - Melanie Blokesch
- Laboratory of Molecular Microbiology, Global Health Institute, School of Life Sciences, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland.
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Shi M, Ye J, Fan F, Zhao F, Zhong X, Zhong Z, Wang H, Wang Z, Yang M. Precisely Controlling Csr sRNA Levels by MshH Enhances Vibrio cholerae Colonization in Adult Mice. Appl Environ Microbiol 2023; 89:e0056123. [PMID: 37404138 PMCID: PMC10370335 DOI: 10.1128/aem.00561-23] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/04/2023] [Accepted: 06/08/2023] [Indexed: 07/06/2023] Open
Abstract
Vibrio cholerae is the causative agent of cholera. Effective intestinal colonization is a key step for V. cholerae pathogenicity and transmission. In this study, we found that deleting mshH, a homolog of the Escherichia coli CsrD protein, caused a V. cholerae colonization defect in the intestine of adult mice. By analyzing the RNA levels of CsrB, CsrC, and CsrD, we found that deleting mshH increased the levels of CsrB and CsrD but decreased the level of CsrC. However, deleting CsrB and -D not only recovered the mshH deletion mutant colonization defect but also recovered CsrC to wild-type levels. These results indicated that controlling the RNA levels of CsrB, -C, and -D is crucial for V. cholerae colonization of adult mice. We further demonstrated that the RNA levels of CsrB and CsrD were mainly controlled by MshH-dependent degradation, yet the level of CsrC was mainly determined by the CsrA-dependent stabilization. Our data show that V. cholerae differentially controls CsrB, -C, and -D abundance through the MshH-CsrB/C/D-CsrA regulatory pathway to finely regulate the activity of CsrA targets such as ToxR, so as to better survive in adult mouse intestine. IMPORTANCE The ability of V. cholerae to colonize the intestine is a key factor for its fitness and transmissibility between hosts. Here, we investigated the mechanism of V. cholerae colonization of adult mammal intestine and found that precisely controlling the CsrB, -C, and -D contents by MshH and CsrA plays an essential role for V. cholerae colonization in the adult mouse intestine. These data expand our knowledge on the mechanism of V. cholerae controlling the RNA level of CsrB, -C, and -D and highlight the importance that the different strategies used by V. cholerae to regulate the RNA level of CsrB, -C, and -D confer the bacterium with a survival advantage.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mengting Shi
- Key Laboratory of Applied Technology on Green-Eco Healthy Animal Husbandry of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Provincial Engineering Laboratory for Animal Health Inspection and Internet Technology, College of Animal Science and Technology, College of Veterinary Medicine, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
- State Key Laboratory of Subtropical Silviculture, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
- College of Life Sciences, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China
| | - Jinjie Ye
- Key Laboratory of Applied Technology on Green-Eco Healthy Animal Husbandry of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Provincial Engineering Laboratory for Animal Health Inspection and Internet Technology, College of Animal Science and Technology, College of Veterinary Medicine, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
| | - Fenxia Fan
- State Key Laboratory of Infectious Disease Prevention and Control, National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, China
| | - Feifei Zhao
- Key Laboratory of Applied Technology on Green-Eco Healthy Animal Husbandry of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Provincial Engineering Laboratory for Animal Health Inspection and Internet Technology, College of Animal Science and Technology, College of Veterinary Medicine, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
| | - Xiaojun Zhong
- Key Laboratory of Applied Technology on Green-Eco Healthy Animal Husbandry of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Provincial Engineering Laboratory for Animal Health Inspection and Internet Technology, College of Animal Science and Technology, College of Veterinary Medicine, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
| | - Zengtao Zhong
- College of Life Sciences, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China
| | - Hui Wang
- College of Life Sciences, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, China
| | - Zhengjia Wang
- State Key Laboratory of Subtropical Silviculture, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
| | - Menghua Yang
- Key Laboratory of Applied Technology on Green-Eco Healthy Animal Husbandry of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Provincial Engineering Laboratory for Animal Health Inspection and Internet Technology, College of Animal Science and Technology, College of Veterinary Medicine, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
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Qin ZX, Chen GZ, Yang QQ, Wu YJ, Sun CQ, Yang XM, Luo M, Yi CR, Zhu J, Chen WH, Liu Z. Cross-Platform Transcriptomic Data Integration, Profiling, and Mining in Vibrio cholerae. Microbiol Spectr 2023; 11:e0536922. [PMID: 37191528 PMCID: PMC10269641 DOI: 10.1128/spectrum.05369-22] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/31/2022] [Accepted: 04/24/2023] [Indexed: 05/17/2023] Open
Abstract
A large number of transcriptome studies generate important data and information for the study of pathogenic mechanisms of pathogens, including Vibrio cholerae. V. cholerae transcriptome data include RNA-seq and microarray: microarray data mainly include clinical human and environmental samples, and RNA-seq data mainly focus on laboratory processing conditions, including different stresses and experimental animals in vivo. In this study, we integrated the data sets of both platforms using Rank-in and the Limma R package normalized Between Arrays function, achieving the first cross-platform transcriptome data integration of V. cholerae. By integrating the entire transcriptome data, we obtained the profiles of the most active or silent genes. By transferring the integrated expression profiles into the weighted correlation network analysis (WGCNA) pipeline, we identified the important functional modules of V. cholerae in vitro stress treatment, gene manipulation, and in vitro culture as DNA transposon, chemotaxis and signaling, signal transduction, and secondary metabolic pathways, respectively. The analysis of functional module hub genes revealed the uniqueness of clinical human samples; however, under specific expression patterning, the Δhns, ΔoxyR1 strains, and tobramycin treatment group showed high expression profile similarity with human samples. By constructing a protein-protein interaction (PPI) interaction network, we discovered several unreported novel protein interactions within transposon functional modules. IMPORTANCE We used two techniques to integrate RNA-seq data for laboratory studies with clinical microarray data for the first time. The interactions between V. cholerae genes were obtained from a global perspective, as well as comparing the similarity between clinical human samples and the current experimental conditions, and uncovering the functional modules that play a major role under different conditions. We believe that this data integration can provide us with some insight and basis for elucidating the pathogenesis and clinical control of V. cholerae.
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Affiliation(s)
- Zi-Xin Qin
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Guo-Zhong Chen
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Qian-Qian Yang
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Ying-Jian Wu
- Department of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology College of Life Sciences and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Chu-Qing Sun
- Department of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology College of Life Sciences and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Xiao-Man Yang
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Mei Luo
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Chun-Rong Yi
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Jun Zhu
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Wei-Hua Chen
- Department of Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology College of Life Sciences and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
| | - Zhi Liu
- Department of Biotechnology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
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Ghandour R, Papenfort K. Small regulatory RNAs in Vibrio cholerae. MICROLIFE 2023; 4:uqad030. [PMID: 37441523 PMCID: PMC10335731 DOI: 10.1093/femsml/uqad030] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/19/2023] [Revised: 06/02/2023] [Accepted: 06/13/2023] [Indexed: 07/15/2023]
Abstract
Vibrio cholerae is a major human pathogen causing the diarrheal disease, cholera. Regulation of virulence in V. cholerae is a multifaceted process involving gene expression changes at the transcriptional and post-transcriptional level. Whereas various transcription factors have been reported to modulate virulence in V. cholerae, small regulatory RNAs (sRNAs) have now been established to also participate in virulence control and the regulation of virulence-associated processes, such as biofilm formation, quorum sensing, stress response, and metabolism. In most cases, these sRNAs act by base-pairing with multiple target transcripts and this process typically requires the aid of an RNA-binding protein, such as the widely conserved Hfq protein. This review article summarizes the functional roles of sRNAs in V. cholerae, their underlying mechanisms of gene expression control, and how sRNAs partner with transcription factors to modulate complex regulatory programs. In addition, we will discuss regulatory principles discovered in V. cholerae that not only apply to other Vibrio species, but further extend into the large field of RNA-mediated gene expression control in bacteria.
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Affiliation(s)
- Rabea Ghandour
- Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Institute of Microbiology, 07745 Jena, Germany
| | - Kai Papenfort
- Corresponding author. Institute of Microbiology, General Microbiology, Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Winzerlaer Straße 2, 07745 Jena, Germany. Tel: +49-3641-949-311; E-mail:
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