Transcriptional variation of diverse enteropathogenic Escherichia coli isolates under virulence-inducing conditions
Date
2017Journal
mSystemsPublisher
American Society for MicrobiologyType
Article
Metadata
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Enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) bacteria are a diverse group of pathogens that cause moderate to severe diarrhea in young children in developing countries. EPEC isolates can be further subclassified as typical EPEC (tEPEC) isolates that contain the bundle-forming pilus (BFP) or as atypical EPEC (aEPEC) isolates that do not contain BFP. Comparative genomics studies have recently highlighted the considerable genomic diversity among EPEC isolates. In the current study, we used RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq) to characterize the global transcriptomes of eight tEPEC isolates representing the identified genomic diversity, as well as one aEPEC isolate. The global transcriptomes were determined for the EPEC isolates under conditions of laboratory growth that are known to induce expression of virulence-associated genes. The findings demonstrate that unique genes of EPEC isolates from diverse phylogenomic lineages contribute to variation in their global transcriptomes. There were also phylogroup-specific differences in the global transcriptomes, including genes involved in iron acquisition, which had significant differential expression in the EPEC isolates belonging to phylogroup B2. Also, three EPEC isolates from the same phylogenomic lineage (EPEC8) had greater levels of similarity in their genomic content and exhibited greater similarities in their global transcriptomes than EPEC from other lineages; however, even among closely related isolates there were isolate-specific differences among their transcriptomes. These findings highlight the transcriptional variability that correlates with the previously unappreciated genomic diversity of EPEC. Copyright 2017 Hazen et al.Sponsors
This project was funded in part by federal funds from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services, under contract no. HHSN272200900009C and grant numbers U19 AI090873 and U19 AI110820 and by start-up funds from the state of Maryland.Identifier to cite or link to this item
https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85041496722&doi=10.1128%2fmSystems.00024-17&partnerID=40&md5=5427838ee508aa3178b12f8e121383cc; http://hdl.handle.net/10713/11284ae974a485f413a2113503eed53cd6c53
10.1128/mSystems.00024-17