#Genome-wide screen in human plasma identifies multifaceted complement evasion of #Pseudomonas aeruginosa | PLOS #Pathogens
#tnseq
https://journals.plos.org/plospathogens/article?id=10.1371/journal.ppat.1011023
Author summary Persistence of bacterial pathogens is a main cause of treatment failure and establishment of chronic bacterial infection. Despite innate immune responses, some bacteria may persist in human blood and plasma. Here we used a genome-wide screen to investigate the molecular determinants influencing Pseudomonas aeruginosa survival in human plasma facing the complement system. Alongside a multifactorial strategy that include surface-attached molecules and bacterial adaptation to stress, we found that intracellular polyphosphates and biotin significantly influence bacterial capacity to deal with membrane attack complex (MAC)-dependent killing. These results underline the need to understand the complex interplay between bacterial pathogens and the human immune system when seeking to develop efficient antibacterial strategies.
Quantifying the local #adaptive landscape of a nascent bacterial community
#tnseq #evolutionarypaths
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-35677-5
Fitness landscapes largely shape the dynamics of evolution, but it is unclear how they shift upon ecological diversification. By engineering genome-wide knockout libraries of a nascent bacterial community, Ascensao et al. show how ecological and epistatic patterns combine to shape adaptive landscapes.
Revealing Causes for False-Positive and False-Negative Calling of Gene #Essentiality in Escherichia coli Using #Transposon Insertion Sequencing
This useful paper looks into strengths and weaknesses of #TnSeq approaches in #bacterial #genetics screens for essential genes.
Importantly, a lot of false positives are attributable to Tn insertion failure on nucleoid-associated DNA — a result that my friends who use #ATACSeq & similar methods to map chromatin states in eukaryotes will be unsurprised by.
The obvious workaround is in vitro transposition on isolated DNA, if your system is amenable to that approach.
Construction of high-density #transposon mutant library of Staphylococcus aureus using #bacteriophage ϕ11 -
#tnseq
Transposon mutant libraries are an important resource to study bacterial metabolism and pathogenesis. The fitness analysis of mutants in the libraries under various growth conditions provides important clues to study the physiology and biogenesis of structural components of a bacterial cell. A trans …
PLOS Biology
Vivek Mutalik
Alexey Merz
Haley Sanderson 