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Journal of Bacteriology, April 1999, p. 2564-2571, Vol. 181, No. 8
0021-9193/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.

Bacteroides fragilis Transfer Factor Tn5520: the Smallest Bacterial Mobilizable Transposon Containing Single Integrase and Mobilization Genes That Function in Escherichia coli

Gayatri Vedantam,1 Thomas J. Novicki,1,dagger and David W. Hecht1,2,*

Hines VA Hospital, Hines, Illinois 60141,2 and Department of Medicine, Section of Infectious Disease, Loyola University Medical Center, Maywood, Illinois 601531

Received 26 August 1998/Accepted 29 January 1999

Many bacterial genera, including Bacteroides spp., harbor mobilizable transposons, a class of transfer factors that carry genes for conjugal DNA transfer and, in some cases, antibiotic resistance. Mobilizable transposons are capable of inserting into and mobilizing other, nontransferable plasmids and are implicated in the dissemination of antibiotic resistance. This paper presents the isolation and characterization of Tn5520, a new mobilizable transposon from Bacteroides fragilis LV23. At 4,692 bp, it is the smallest mobilizable transposon reported from any bacterial genus. Tn5520 was captured from B. fragilis LV23 by using the transfer-deficient shuttle vector pGAT400Delta BglII. The termini of Tn5520 contain a 22-bp imperfect inverted repeat, and transposition does not result in a target site repeat. Tn5520 also demonstrates insertion site sequence preferences characterized by A-T-rich nucleotide sequences. Tn5520 has been sequenced in its entirety, and two large open reading frames whose predicted protein products exhibit strong sequence similarity to recombinase-integrase enzymes and mobilization proteins, respectively, have been identified. The transfer, mobilization, and transposition properties of Tn5520 have been studied, revealing that Tn5520 mobilizes plasmids in both B. fragilis and Escherichia coli at high frequency and also transposes in E. coli.

* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Department of Medicine, Section of Infectious Disease, Loyola University Medical Center, Bldg. 54, Room 101, 2160 S. First Avenue, Maywood, IL 60153. Phone: (708) 216-2792. Fax: (708) 216-2269. E-mail: dhecht{at}luc.edu.

dagger Present address: Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, Washington.

Journal of Bacteriology, April 1999, p. 2564-2571, Vol. 181, No. 8
0021-9193/99/$04.00+0
Copyright © 1999, American Society for Microbiology. All rights reserved.


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