Mos1 mutagenesis reveals a diversity of mechanisms affecting response of Caenorhabditis elegans to the bacterial pathogen Microbacterium nematophilum.
A specific host-pathogen interaction exists between Caenorhabditis elegans and the gram-positive bacterium Microbacterium nematophilum. This bacterium is able to colonize the rectum of susceptible worms and induces a defensive tail-swelling response in the host. Previous mutant screens have identified multiple loci that affect this interaction. Some of these loci correspond to known genes, but many bus genes [those with a bacterially unswollen (Bus) mutant phenotype] have yet to be cloned. We employed Mos1 transposon mutagenesis as a means of more rapidly cloning bus genes and identifying new mutants with altered pathogen response. This approach revealed new infection-related roles for two well-characterized and much-studied genes, egl-8 and tax-4. It also allowed the cloning of a known bus gene, bus-17, which encodes a predicted galactosyltransferase, and of a new bus gene, bus-19, which encodes a novel, albeit ancient, protein. The results illustrate advantages and disadvantages of Mos1 transposon mutagenesis in this system.
Yook
Karen
K
Genetics Unit, Department of Biochemistry, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3QU, United Kingdom.
Hodgkin
Jonathan
J
D000192:Actinomycetales / Q000502:physiology*; D000595:Amino Acid Sequence; D000818:Animals; D001422:Bacterial Adhesion; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D017173:Caenorhabditis elegans / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000382:microbiology*; D029742:Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins / Q000737:chemistry / Q000302:isolation & purification / Q000378:metabolism; D002874:Chromosome Mapping; D054815:Cyclic Nucleotide-Gated Cation Channels; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements / Q000235:genetics*; D004198:Disease Susceptibility; D017238:Genes, Helminth; D007473:Ion Channels / Q000378:metabolism; D008969:Molecular Sequence Data; D016254:Mutagenesis, Insertional; D050505:Mutant Proteins / Q000302:isolation & purification; D009154:Mutation / Q000235:genetics; D009474:Neurons / Q000378:metabolism; D010641:Phenotype; D016415:Sequence Alignment
D029742:Caenorhabditis elegans Proteins; D054815:Cyclic Nucleotide-Gated Cation Channels; D004251:DNA Transposable Elements; D007473:Ion Channels; D050505:Mutant Proteins; C102184:tax-4 protein, C elegans