Jin-Ki Eom

Antibiotics can induce cell death via a variety of action modes, including the inhibition of transcription, ribosomal function, and cell wall biosynthesis. In this study, we demonstrated directly that iron availability is important to the action of antibiotics, and the ferric reductases of Pseudomonas putida and Pseudomonas aeruginosa could accelerate antibiotic-mediated cell death by promoting the Fenton reaction. The modulation of reduced nicotinamide-adenine dinucleotide (NADH) levels and iro

Acinetobacter baumannii is an aerobic and gram-negative pathogenic bacterium that is resistant to most antibiotics. Recently, A. baumannii 1656-2 exhibited the ability to form biofilms under clinical conditions. In this study, global metabolite profiling of both planktonic and biofilm forms of A. baumannii 1656-2 was performed using high-resolution nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and multivariate statistical analysis to investigate the metabolic patterns leading to biofilm formatio

Pseudomonas putida harbors two ferredoxin-NADP(+) reductases (Fprs) on its chromosome, and their functions remain largely unknown. Ferric reductase is structurally contained within the Fpr superfamily. Interestingly, ferric reductase is not annotated on the chromosome of P. putida. In an effort to elucidate the function of the Fpr as a ferric reductase, we used a variety of biochemical and physiological methods using the wild-type and mutant strains. In both the ferric reductase and flavin reduc

Significance The murine protein Slc11a1 (SLC11A1 in humans) hinders replication of invading microbes by provoking Mg 2+ limitation in host tissues. To withstand Mg 2+ limitation and to promote survival in Slc11a1 + / + macrophages, the intracellular pathogen Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium requires MgtB, one of its three Mg 2+ transporters and the only one absent from commensal Escherichia coli . Although MgtB is 50% identical to the Mg 2+ transporter MgtA, the latter is dispensable for

to recover faster from stationary phase. Our findings suggest that protein preservation during a slow-growth state is a conserved microbial strategy that facilitates the return to a growth state once nutrients become available.

The oxyR gene appears to reside in an operon with the recG helicase gene in many bacteria, including pathogenic Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Pseudomonas putida. Analysis of P. putida transcriptomes shows that many OxyR-controlled genes are regulated by the ATP-dependent RecG helicase and that RecG alone modulates the expression of many genes. We found that purified RecG binds to the promoters of many OxyR-controlled genes and that expression of these genes was not induced under conditions of oxida

The resulting decrease in ClpS amounts diminishes proteolysis of several ClpSAP-dependent substrates, including the putrescine aminotransferase Oat, which heightens the formation of antibiotic persisters, and the transcriptional regulators UvrY and PhoP, which alter the expression of genes controlled by these proteins. By contrast, the decrease in ClpS amounts did not impact the abundance of the ClpSAP substrate FtsA, reflecting that FtsA binds to ClpS more tightly than to UvrY and PhoP. Our fin

All cells use proteases to adjust protein amounts. Proteases maintain protein homeostasis by degrading nonfunctional toxic proteins and play regulatory roles by targeting particular substrates in response to specific signals. Here we address how cells tune protease specificity to nutritional signals. We report that Salmonella enterica increases the specificity of the broadly conserved proteases Lon and ClpSAP by transforming the Lon activator and substrate HspQ into an inhibitor of the N-degron

Ferredoxin-NADP(+) reductase (Fpr) is known to control NADP(+)/NADPH pool in proteobacteria. There is only one fpr gene present in most proteobacteria, but Pseudomonas putida has two Fprs (FprA and FprB). We elucidated the functional relationships between the two types of Fpr and their electron transport partners [ferredoxin (Fd) and flavodoxin (Fld)] by cloning, expressing and preparing these proteins in various combinations and assessing their properties in vitro and in vivo using biochemical

This study uncovers the molecular processes governing the adaptive evolution of multidrug-resistant (MDR) pathogens without antibiotic pressure. Genomic analysis of MDR Acinetobacter baumannii cells cultured for 8000 generations under starvation conditions (EAB1) or nutrient-rich conditions (EAB2) revealed significant genomic changes, primarily by insertion sequence (IS)-mediated insertions and deletions. Only two Acinetobacter-specific prophage-related deletions and translocations were observed

Flavodoxin (Fld) has been demonstrated to bind to ferredoxin- NADP(+) reductase A (FprA) in Pseudomonas putida. Two residues (Phe(256), Lys(259)) of FprA are likely to be important for interacting with Fld based on homology modeling. Sitedirected mutagenesis and pH-dependent enzyme kinetics were performed to further examine the role of these residues. The catalytic efficiencies of FprA-Ala(259) and FprA-Asp(259) proteins were two-fold lower than those of the wild-type FprA. Homology modeling als

The bacterium Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium narrows down the spectrum of substrates degraded by the proteases Lon and ClpAP in response to low cytoplasmic Mg 2+ , a condition that decreases protein synthesis. This control is exerted by PhoP, a transcriptional regulator activated in low cytoplasmic Mg 2+ that governs proteostasis and is conserved in enteric bacteria. The uncovered mechanism enables bacteria to control the abundance of preexisting proteins.