title: A temperature-induced narrow DNA curvature range sustains the maximum activity of a bacterial promoter in vitro.
abstract: Among the molecular strategies bacteria have set up to quickly match their transcriptional program to new environments, changes in sequence-mediated DNA curvature play a crucial role. Bacterial promoters, especially those of mesophilic bacteria, are in general preceded by a curved region. The marked thermosensitivity of curved DNA stretches allows bacteria to rapidly sense outer temperature variations and affects transcription by favoring the binding of activators or repressors. Curved DNA is also able to influence the transcriptional activity of a bacterial promoter directly, without the involvement of trans-acting regulators. This study attempts to quantitatively analyze the role of DNA curvature in thermoregulated gene expression using a real-time in vitro transcription model system based on a specific fluorescence molecular beacon. By analyzing the temperature-dependent expression of a reporter gene in a construct carrying a progressively decreasing bent sequence upstream from the promoter, we show that with a decrease in temperature a narrow curvature range accounts for a significant enhancement of promoter activity. This strengthens the view that DNA curvature-mediated regulation of gene expression is likely a strategy offering fine-tuning control possibilities and that, considering the widespread presence of curved sequences upstream from bacterial promoters, it may represent one of the most primitive forms of gene regulation.
authors.affiliation: Istituto Pasteur Fondazione Cenci Bolognetti, Dip. Biologia Cellulare e dello Sviluppo, Sapienza Univ. Roma, via dei Sardi 70, 00185 Roma, Italy.
authors.forename: Gianni
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Prosseda
authors.forename: Alessia
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mazzola
authors.forename: Maria Letizia
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Di Martino
authors.forename: Denis
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Tielker
authors.forename: Gioacchino
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Micheli
authors.forename: Bianca
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Colonna
mesh_terms: D016831:Crithidia fasciculata / Q000235:genetics; D004269:DNA, Bacterial / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics; D015964:Gene Expression Regulation, Bacterial; D005798:Genes, Bacterial; D009690:Nucleic Acid Conformation; D011401:Promoter Regions, Genetic / Q000235:genetics*; D013696:Temperature
chemical_list: D004269:DNA, Bacterial