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Journal of Bacteriology, May 2008, p. 3747-3756, Vol. 190, No. 10
0021-9193/08/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/JB.01870-07
Copyright © 2008, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Multiple Genes Repress Motility in Uropathogenic Escherichia coli Constitutively Expressing Type 1 Fimbriae ^,

Amy N. Simms and Harry L. T. Mobley^*

Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109

Received 28 November 2007/ Accepted 11 March 2008

Two surface organelles of uropathogenic Escherichia coli (UPEC), flagella and type 1 fimbriae, are critical for colonization of the urinary tract but mediate opposite actions. Flagella propel bacteria through urine and along mucus layers, while type 1 fimbriae allow bacteria to adhere to specific receptors present on uroepithelial cells. Constitutive expression of type 1 fimbriae leads to repression of motility and chemotaxis in UPEC strain CFT073, suggesting that UPEC may coordinately regulate motility and adherence. To identify genes involved in this regulation of motility by type 1 fimbriae, transposon mutagenesis was performed on a phase-locked type 1 fimbrial ON variant of strain CFT073 (CFT073 fim L-ON), followed by a screen for restoration of motility in soft agar. Functions of the genes identified included attachment, metabolism, transport, DNA mismatch repair, and transcriptional regulation, and a number of genes had hypothetical function. Isogenic deletion mutants of these genes were also constructed in CFT073 fim L-ON. Motility was partially restored in six of these mutants, including complementable mutations in four genes encoding known transcriptional regulators, lrhA, lrp, slyA, and papX; a mismatch repair gene, mutS; and one hypothetical gene, ydiV. Type 1 fimbrial expression in these mutants was unaltered, and the majority of these mutants expressed larger amounts of flagellin than the fim L-ON parental strain. Our results indicate that repression of motility in CFT073 fim L-ON is not solely due to the constitutive expression of type 1 fimbriae on the surfaces of the bacteria and that multiple genes may contribute to this repression.

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* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department of Microbiology and Immunology, University of Michigan Medical School, 5641 Medical Science Building II, 1150 West Medical Center Drive, Ann Arbor, MI 48109. Phone: (734) 763-3531. Fax: (734) 764-3562. E-mail: hmobley{at}umich.edu

Published ahead of print on 21 March 2008.

Supplemental material for this article may be found at http://jb.asm.org/.

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Journal of Bacteriology, May 2008, p. 3747-3756, Vol. 190, No. 10
0021-9193/08/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/JB.01870-07
Copyright © 2008, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Wozniak, C. E., Lee, C., Hughes, K. T. (2009). T-POP Array Identifies EcnR and PefI-SrgD as Novel Regulators of Flagellar Gene Expression. J. Bacteriol. 191: 1498-1508 [Abstract] [Full Text]  
• Simms, A. N., Mobley, H. L. T. (2008). PapX, a P Fimbrial Operon-Encoded Inhibitor of Motility in Uropathogenic Escherichia coli. Infect. Immun. 76: 4833-4841 [Abstract] [Full Text]