Cis-2-dodecenoic acid quorum sensing system modulates N-acyl homoserine lactone production through RpfR and cyclic di-GMP turnover in Burkholderia cenocepacia

Cis-2-dodecenoic acid quorum sensing system modulates N-acyl homoserine lactone production through RpfR and cyclic di-GMP turnover in Burkholderia cenocepacia

BMC Microbiology

10.1186/1471-2180-13-148

http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2180/13/148

Yinyue Deng, Amy Lim, Jing Wang, Tielin Zhou, Shaohua Chen, Jasmine Lee, Yi-hu Dong, Lian-Hui Zhang

01 July 2013

Deng et al.: Cis-2-dodecenoic acid quorum sensing system modulates N-acyl homoserine lactone production through RpfR and cyclic di-GMP turnover in Burkholderia cenocepacia. BMC Microbiology 2013 13:148.

Background: Burkholderia cenocepacia employs both N-Acyl homoserine lactone (AHL) and cis-2-dodecenoic acid (BDSF) quorum sensing (QS) systems in regulation of bacterial virulence. It was shown recently that disruption of BDSF synthase RpfFBc caused a reduction of AHL signal production in B. cenocepacia. However, how BDSF system influences AHL system is still not clear. Results: We show here that BDSF system controls AHL system through a novel signaling mechanism. Null mutation of either the BDSF synthase, RpfFBc, or the BDSF receptor, RpfR, caused a substantial down-regulation of AHL signal production in B. cenocepacia strain H111. Genetic and biochemical analyses showed that BDSF system controls AHL signal production through the transcriptional regulation of the AHL synthase gene cepI by modulating the intracellular level of second messenger cyclic di-GMP (c-di-GMP). Furthermore, we show that BDSF and AHL systems have a cumulative role in the regulation of various biological functions, including swarming motility, biofilm formation and virulence factor production, and exogenous addition of either BDSF or AHL signal molecules could only partially rescue the changed phenotypes of the double deletion mutant defective in BDSF and AHL signal production. Conclusions: These results, together with our previous findings, thus depict a molecular mechanism with which BDSF regulates AHL signal production and bacterial virulence through modulating the phosphodiesterase activity of its receptor RpfR to influence the intracellular level of c-di-GMP.

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

https://oar.a-star.edu.sg/communities-collections/articles/11481

Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology