The prevalence of the ibe10 gene, of the pap, afa, and sfa adhesin-encoding operons, and of a 14.9-kb rrn-containing HindIII fragment was studied for 67 Escherichia coli neonatal meningitis strains, 58 E. coli K1 commensal strains, and 47 E. coli blood isolates from neonates without meningitis. ibe10, sfa, and the 14.9-kb HindIII fragment were observed significantly more often in the meningitis...

Solvent synthesis in Clostridium acetobutylicum is induced in concert with sporulation to counteract the dangerous effects of produced butyric and acetic acids and to provide the cell with sufficient time to complete endospore formation. Cardinal transcription units for butanol and acetone production are the sol and adc operons encoding butyraldehyde/butanol dehydrogenase and coenzyme A transfe...

The genes encoding many biomolecular systems and pathways are genomically organized in operons or gene clusters. With MultiGeneBlast, we provide a user-friendly and effective tool to perform homology searches with operons or gene clusters as basic units, instead of single genes. The contextualization offered by MultiGeneBlast allows users to get a better understanding of the function, evolution...

Extensive DNA sequencing of the chloroplast genome of the red alga Porphyra purpurea has resulted in the detection of more than 125 genes. Fifty-eight (approximately 46%) of these genes are not found on the chloroplast genomes of land plants. These include genes encoding 17 photosynthetic proteins, three tRNAs, and nine ribosomal proteins. In addition, nine genes encoding proteins related to bi...

PpsR from the anoxygenic phototrophic bacterium Rhodobacter sphaeroides has been known as an oxygen- and light-dependent repressor of bacteriochlorophyll and carotenoid biosynthesis genes and puc operons involved in photosystem development. However, the putative PpsR-binding sites, TGTN12ACA, are also located upstream of numerous nonphotosystem genes, thus raising the possibility that the role ...

Nucleotide sequence analysis revealed a 1,791-bp open reading frame in the hox gene cluster of the gram-negative chemolithotroph Alcaligenes eutrophus H16. In order to investigate the biological role of this open reading frame, we generated an in-frame deletion allele via a gene replacement strategy. The resulting mutant grew significantly more slowly than the wild type under lithoautotrophic c...

The sequence of a 281-kbp contig from the crenarchaeote Sulfolobus solfataricus P2 was determined and analysed. Notable features in this region include 29 ribosomal protein genes, 12 tRNA genes (four of which contain archaeal-type introns), operons encoding enzymes of histidine biosynthesis, pyrimidine biosynthesis, and arginine biosynthesis, an ATPase operon, numerous genes for enzymes of lipo...

Salmonella Typhimurium is the leading cause of human non-typhoidal gastroenteritis in the US. S. Kentucky is one the most commonly recovered serovars from commercially processed poultry carcasses. This study compared the genotypic and phenotypic properties of two Salmonella enterica strains Typhimurium (ST221_31B) and Kentucky (SK222_32B) recovered from commercially processed chicken carcasses ...

Mono- and diterpenoids are of great industrial and medical value as specialty chemicals and pharmaceuticals. Production of these compounds in microbial hosts, such as Escherichia coli, can be limited by intracellular levels of the polyprenyl diphosphate precursors, geranyl diphosphate (GPP), and geranylgeranyl diphosphate (GGPP). To alleviate this limitation, we constructed synthetic operons th...