Variability in bacterial flagella re-growth patterns after breakage

Autor: Guillaume Paradis, Fabienne F. V. Chevance, Willisa Liou, Thibaud T. Renault, Kelly T. Hughes, Simon Rainville, Marc Erhardt
Jazyk: angličtina
Rok vydání: 2017
Předmět:
Zdroj: Scientific Reports, Vol 7, Iss 1, Pp 1-10 (2017)
Druh dokumentu: article
ISSN: 2045-2322
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-01302-5
Popis: Abstract Many bacteria swim through liquids or crawl on surfaces by rotating long appendages called flagella. Flagellar filaments are assembled from thousands of subunits that are exported through a narrow secretion channel and polymerize beneath a capping scaffold at the tip of the growing filament. The assembly of a flagellum uses a significant proportion of the biosynthetic capacities of the cell with each filament constituting ~1% of the total cell protein. Here, we addressed a significant question whether a flagellar filament can form a new cap and resume growth after breakage. Re-growth of broken filaments was visualized using sequential 3-color fluorescent labeling of filaments after mechanical shearing. Differential electron microscopy revealed the formation of new cap structures on broken filaments that re-grew. Flagellar filaments are therefore able to re-grow if broken by mechanical shearing forces, which are expected to occur frequently in nature. In contrast, no re-growth was observed on filaments that had been broken using ultrashort laser pulses, a technique allowing for very local damage to individual filaments. We thus conclude that assembly of a new cap at the tip of a broken filament depends on how the filament was broken.
Databáze: Directory of Open Access Journals
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