| 1. |
- Normand, Philippe, et al.
(författare)
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Genome characteristics of facultatively symbiotic Frankia sp. strains reflect host range and host plant biogeography.
- 2007
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Ingår i: Genome Research. - : Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. - 1088-9051. ; 17:1, s. 7-15
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Soil bacteria that also form mutualistic symbioses in plants encounter two major levels of selection. One occurs during adaptation to and survival in soil, and the other occurs in concert with host plant speciation and adaptation. Actinobacteria from the genus Frankia are facultative symbionts that form N2-fixing root nodules on diverse and globally distributed angiosperms in the "actinorhizal" symbioses. Three closely related clades of Frankia sp. strains are recognized; members of each clade infect a subset of plants from among eight angiosperm families. We sequenced the genomes from three strains; their sizes varied from 5.43 Mbp for a narrow host range strain (Frankia sp. strain HFPCcI3) to 7.50 Mbp for a medium host range strain (Frankia alni strain ACN14a) to 9.04 Mbp for a broad host range strain (Frankia sp. strain EAN1pec.) This size divergence is the largest yet reported for such closely related soil bacteria (97.8%–98.9% identity of 16S rRNA genes). The extent of gene deletion, duplication, and acquisition is in concert with the biogeographic history of the symbioses and host plant speciation. Host plant isolation favored genome contraction, whereas host plant diversification favored genome expansion. The results support the idea that major genome expansions as well as reductions can occur in facultative symbiotic soil bacteria as they respond to new environments in the context of their symbioses.
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| 2. |
- Santos, Catarina L, et al.
(författare)
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Modulation of Frankia alni ACN14a oxidative stress response: activity, expression and phylogeny of catalases
- 2007
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Ingår i: Physiologia Plantarum. - : Wiley. - 0031-9317 .- 1399-3054. ; 130, s. 454-463
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The finding that an oxidative burst was a general phenomenon in the response of hosts challenged by various symbiotic or pathogenic microbes has stimulated increasing interest in investigating the enzymology of antioxidant protection in bacteria. The question of whether the antioxidant mechanisms have been a decisive evolutionary driving force for the nitrogen-fixing microsymbiont Frankia spp. is still open. In this study, Frankia alni strain ACN14a, which is a mid-range infective strain, was used as a model to explore the basal oxidative stress response in terms of enzymatic activity, relative expression and phylogeny. Non-denaturing polyacrylamide gels stained for catalatic activity revealed the presence of two monofunctional catalases KatA and KatB (EC number 1.11.1.6), which activity was shown to increase when the cells were challenged with the oxidants H2O2 and methyl viologen. Real-time RT-PCR targeting the two genes showed a consistent increase in the number of transcripts when the RNA was extracted from oxidative stress-induced cells. Comparison between the expression and the activity data suggests that posttranscriptional mechanisms might be involved in the regulation of catalases in F. alni. Furthermore, upstream of katA, a fur gene coding for a ferric uptake regulator was found, forming a gene pair that functionally resembles the conserved actinobacterial synton fur–katG, which contains a gene coding for a catalase–peroxidase. Phylogenetic analysis of the F. alni fur–katA synton suggests that this genomic organization was the result of genome reshuffling events.
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| 3. |
- Tavares, Fernando, et al.
(författare)
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Reactive oxygen species in legume and actinorhizal nitrogen-fixing symbioses: the microsymbiont’s responses to an unfriendly reception
- 2007
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Ingår i: Physiologia Plantarum. - : Wiley. - 0031-9317 .- 1399-3054. ; 130, s. 344-356
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The plant responses to infection by pathogenic bacteria have been extensively reviewed in recent years, including the spatial and temporal production of reactive oxygen species (ROS). The immediate and localized release of ROS upon infection, known as the oxidative burst, was shown not only to be part of the hypersensitive response but also likely responsible for mediating, directly or via signal transduction pathways, other plant defence strategies. This paradigm inspired studies in nitrogen-fixing root nodule symbioses, and a parallelism is unavoidable. In rhizobia–legume symbioses, histochemical data revealed the presence of ROS in the host infection threads and in the root nodules primordia. On the other hand, in actinorhizal infections, it has been shown that Alnus glutinosa root exudates induce several oxidative stress response-related proteins in compatible Frankia. These data suggest that the nitrogen-fixing microsymbionts must have had to evolve adaptations to overcome and possibly regulate an unfriendly environment. In this review, particular emphasis will be given to the bacteria antioxidant mechanisms at different developmental stages of the nitrogen-fixing root nodule symbioses.
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