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Journal of Bacteriology, January 2009, p. 365-374, Vol. 191, No. 1
0021-9193/09/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/JB.01183-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Expression and Physiological Relevance of Agrobacterium tumefaciens Phosphatidylcholine Biosynthesis Genes{triangledown}

Sonja Klüsener,1,# Meriyem Aktas,1,# Kai M. Thormann,1,2 Mirja Wessel,1 and Franz Narberhaus1*

Microbial Biology, Ruhr-University Bochum, Bochum, Germany,1 Department of Ecophysiology, Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, Marburg, Germany2

Received 22 August 2008/ Accepted 23 October 2008

Phosphatidylcholine (PC), or lecithin, is the major phospholipid in eukaryotic membranes, whereas only 10% of all bacteria are predicted to synthesize PC. In Rhizobiaceae, including the phytopathogenic bacterium Agrobacterium tumefaciens, PC is essential for the establishment of a successful host-microbe interaction. A. tumefaciens produces PC via two alternative pathways, the methylation pathway and the Pcs pathway. The responsible genes, pmtA (coding for a phospholipid N-methyltransferase) and pcs (coding for a PC synthase), are located on the circular chromosome of A. tumefaciens C58. Recombinant expression of pmtA and pcs in Escherichia coli revealed that the individual proteins carry out the annotated enzyme functions. Both genes and a putative ABC transporter operon downstream of PC are constitutively expressed in A. tumefaciens. The amount of PC in A. tumefaciens membranes reaches around 23% of total membrane lipids. We show that PC is distributed in both the inner and outer membranes. Loss of PC results in reduced motility and increased biofilm formation, two processes known to be involved in virulence. Our work documents the critical importance of membrane lipid homeostasis for diverse cellular processes in A. tumefaciens.

* Corresponding author. Mailing address: Lehrstuhl für Biologie der Mikroorganismen, Fakultät für Biologie und Biotechnologie, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, D-44780 Bochum, Germany. Phone: 49 (234) 32 23100. Fax: 49 (234) 32 14620. E-mail: franz.narberhaus{at}rub.de

{triangledown} Published ahead of print on 31 October 2008.

# S.K. and M.A. contributed equally to this study.

Journal of Bacteriology, January 2009, p. 365-374, Vol. 191, No. 1
0021-9193/09/$08.00+0     doi:10.1128/JB.01183-08
Copyright © 2009, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.



This article has been cited by other articles:

  • Aktas, M., Narberhaus, F. (2009). In Vitro Characterization of the Enzyme Properties of the Phospholipid N-Methyltransferase PmtA from Agrobacterium tumefaciens. J. Bacteriol. 191: 2033-2041 [Abstract] [Full Text]  


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