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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Ling Juan Wu
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0).
© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.Transcriptional regulation allows adaptive and coordinated gene expression, and is essential for life. Processive antitermination systems alter the transcription elongation complex to allow the RNA polymerase to read through multiple terminators in an operon. Here, we describe the discovery of a novel bipartite antitermination system that is widespread among conjugative elements from Gram-positive bacteria, which we named conAn. This system is composed of a large RNA element that exerts antitermination, and a protein that functions as a processivity factor. Besides allowing coordinated expression of very long operons, we show that these systems allow differential expression of genes within an operon, and probably contribute to strict regulation of the conjugation genes by minimizing the effects of spurious transcription. Mechanistic features of the conAn system are likely to decisively influence its host range, with important implications for the spread of antibiotic resistance and virulence genes.
Author(s): Miguel-Arribas A, Val-Calvo J, Gago-Cordoba C, Izquierdo JM, Abia D, Wu LJ, Errington J, Meijer WJJ
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Nucleic acids research
Year: 2021
Volume: 49
Issue: 10
Pages: 5553-5567
Print publication date: 04/06/2021
Online publication date: 17/05/2021
Acceptance date: 23/04/2021
Date deposited: 28/06/2021
ISSN (print): 1362-4962
ISSN (electronic): 0305-1048
Publisher: Oxford University Press
URL: https://doi.org/10.1093/nar/gkab360
DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkab360
PubMed id: 33999173
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