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Volume 160, Issue 1

The prevalence and origin of exoprotease-producing cells in the biofilm Free

Abstract

Biofilm formation by the Gram-positive bacterium is tightly controlled at the level of transcription. The biofilm contains specialized cell types that arise from controlled differentiation of the resident isogenic bacteria. DegU is a response regulator that controls several social behaviours exhibited by including swarming motility, biofilm formation and extracellular protease (exoprotease) production. Here, for the first time, we examine the prevalence and origin of exoprotease-producing cells within the biofilm. This was accomplished using single-cell analysis techniques including flow cytometry and fluorescence microscopy. We established that the number of exoprotease-producing cells increases as the biofilm matures. This is reflected by both an increase at the level of transcription and an increase in exoprotease activity over time. We go on to demonstrate that exoprotease-producing cells arise from more than one cell type, namely matrix-producing and non-matrix-producing cells. these findings allow us to add exoprotease-producing cells to the list of specialized cell types that are derived during biofilm formation and furthermore the data highlight the plasticity in the origin of differentiated cells.

  • Received:
  • Accepted:
  • Published Online:
Funding
This study was supported by the:
  • BBSRC (Award BB/C520404/1)
  • Wellcome Trust (Award 093714/Z/10/Z and 100149/Z/12/Z)
  • Wellcome Trust (Award 083524/Z/07/Z)
© Microbiology Society
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/content/journal/micro/10.1099/mic.0.072389-0
2014-01-01
2024-04-25
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The prevalence and origin of exoprotease-producing cells in the Bacillus subtilis biofilm
Microbiology 160, 56 (2014); https://doi.org/10.1099/mic.0.072389-0
/content/journal/micro/10.1099/mic.0.072389-0
/content/journal/micro/10.1099/mic.0.072389-0
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