PMID:21278284

Citation	McLoon, AL, Guttenplan, SB, Kearns, DB, Kolter, R and Losick, R (2011) Tracing the domestication of a biofilm-forming bacterium. J. Bacteriol. 193:2027-34
Abstract	Over the course of more than a century of laboratory experimentation, Bacillus subtilis has become "domesticated," losing its ability to carry out many behaviors characteristic of its wild ancestors. One such characteristic is the ability to form architecturally complex communities, referred to as biofilms. Previous work has shown that the laboratory strain 168 forms markedly attenuated biofilms compared with the wild strain NCIB3610 (3610), even after repair of a mutation in sfp (a gene involved in surfactin production) previously known to impair biofilm formation. Here, we show that in addition to the sfp mutation, mutations in epsC, swrA, and degQ are necessary and sufficient to explain the inability of the laboratory strain to produce robust biofilms. Finally, we show that the architecture of the biofilm is markedly influenced by a large plasmid present in 3610 but not 168 and that the effect of the plasmid can be attributed to a gene we designate rapP. When rapP is introduced into 168 together with wild-type alleles of sfp, epsC, swrA, and degQ, the resulting repaired laboratory strain forms biofilms that are as robust as and essentially indistinguishable in architecture from those of the wild strain, 3610. Thus, domestication of B. subtilis involved the accumulation of four mutations and the loss of a plasmid-borne gene.
Links	PubMed PMC3133032 Online version:10.1128/JB.01542-10
Keywords	Amino Acid Sequence; Bacillus subtilis/genetics; Bacillus subtilis/growth & development; Bacterial Proteins/genetics; Base Sequence; Biofilms/growth & development; Evolution, Molecular; Genetic Complementation Test; Molecular Sequence Data; Mutation; Plasmids; Serial Passage
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Annotations

Gene product	Qualifier	GO Term	Evidence Code	with/from	Aspect	Extension	Notes	Status
BACSU:SFP		GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315:		P		Table 1, 2nd row	complete CACAO 10157
BACSU:SFP	involved_in	GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315: mutant phenotype evidence used in manual assertion		P		Seeded From UniProt	complete
BACSU:DEGQ	involved_in	GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315: mutant phenotype evidence used in manual assertion		P		Seeded From UniProt	complete
BACSU:DEGQ		GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315:		P		Figure 1. row 5	complete CACAO 10161
BACSU:SWRAA		GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315:		P		Figure 1, row 4	complete CACAO 10160
BACSU:SWRAA	involved_in	GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315: mutant phenotype evidence used in manual assertion		P		Seeded From UniProt	complete
BACSU:EPSC		GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315:		P		Figure 1, row 3	complete CACAO 10159
BACSU:EPSC	involved_in	GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315: mutant phenotype evidence used in manual assertion		P		Seeded From UniProt	complete
BACIU:R9RWQ9	involved_in	GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315: mutant phenotype evidence used in manual assertion		P		Seeded From UniProt	complete
BACIU:R9RWQ9		GO:1900192: positive regulation of single-species biofilm formation	ECO:0000315:		P		Figure 1, row 7 McLoon and co. created a construct containing the rapP gene from B.subtilis 3610 and transformed it into B. subtilis 168 and the figure is showing the expression of this gene from the plasmid	complete CACAO 10162

References

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