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Volume 71, Issue 1

Thymidine utilisation pathway is a novel phenotypic switch of Open Access

Abstract

is a bacterium belonging to the class . It causes acute and chronic infections of the urogenital tract. The main features of this bacterium are an absence of cell wall and a reduced genome size (517–622 protein-encoding genes). Previously, we have isolated morphologically unknown colonies called micro-colonies (MCs) from the serum of patients with inflammatory urogenital tract infection.

MCs are functionally different from the typical colonies (TCs) in terms of metabolism and cell division.

To determine the physiological differences between MCs and TCs of and elucidate the pathways of formation and growth of MCs by a comparative proteomic analysis of these two morphological forms.

LC–MS proteomic analysis of TCs and MCs using an Ultimate 3000 RSLC nanoHPLC system connected to a QExactive Plus mass spectrometer.

The study of the proteomic profiles of colonies allowed us to reconstruct their energy metabolism pathways. In addition to the already known pentose phosphate and arginine deamination pathways, can utilise ribose phosphate and deoxyribose phosphate formed by nucleoside catabolism as energy sources. Comparative proteomic HPLC–MS analysis revealed that the proteomic profiles of TCs and MCs were different. We assume that MC cells preferably utilised deoxyribonucleosides, particularly thymidine, as an energy source rather than arginine or ribonucleosides. Utilisation of deoxyribonucleosides is less efficient as compared with that of ribonucleosides and arginine in terms of energy production. Thymidine phosphorylase DeoA is one of the key enzymes of deoxyribonucleosides utilisation. We obtained a DeoA overexpressing mutant that exhibited a phenotype similar to that of MCs, which confirmed our hypothesis.

In addition to the two known pathways for energy production (arginine deamination and the pentose phosphate pathway) can use deoxyribonucleosides and ribonucleosides. MC cells demonstrate a reorganisation of energy metabolism: unlike TC cells, they preferably utilise deoxyribonucleosides, particularly thymidine, as an energy source rather than arginine or ribonucleosides. Thus MC cells enter a state of energy starvation, which helps them to survive under stress, and in particular, to be resistant to antibiotics.

  • Received:
  • Accepted:
  • Published Online:
Keyword(s): micro-colonies , Mycoplasma hominis , nucleoside catabolism , proteomic analysis , resistant to antibiotics and thymidine phosphorylase
Funding
This study was supported by the:
  • Russian Science Foundation (Award 19-75-10124)
    • Principle Award Recipient: TatianaA. Semashko
© 2022 The Authors
  • This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.
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2022-01-17
2024-04-25
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Thymidine utilisation pathway is a novel phenotypic switch of Mycoplasma hominis
J. Med. Microbiol. 71, 001468 (2022); https://doi.org/10.1099/jmm.0.001468
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