Conjugation manner of natural plasmids to plural recipient candidates

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K14686
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Applied microbiology
• Research Institution: The University of Tokyo
• Principal Investigator: NOJIRI Hideaki 東京大学, 生物生産工学研究センター, 教授 (90272468)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 細菌 / 遺伝子水平伝播 / 接合伝達 / 微生物群集

Outline of Final Research Achievements

To reveal the mechanisms determining plasmid behavior in nature, we assessed the transferability of plasmids from one donor strain to either of two recipient candidates as the most simplified example of conjugation in consortia. Two different Pseudomonas strains were used as model hosts and pCAR1, NAH7, pB10, and R388 were used as model plasmids. Plasmids were generally transferred more frequently to the same species than to different. The coexistence of other recipients enhanced such tendency to be transferred to the same species more frequently, while pCAR1 transfer was less affected.
To clarify the factor(s) affecting such phenomena, we constructed a screening method with BAC library of recipient chromosomal genome. It was suggested that there were some regions which accelerate plasmid recruitment from the same species. We also constructed the screening method of transposon inserted library of NAH7 in order to search the factor encoded on plasmid, and obtained 8 candidates.

Free Research Field

環境微生物学