title: Global genotype-phenotype correlations in Pseudomonas aeruginosa.
abstract: Once the genome sequence of an organism is obtained, attention turns from identifying genes to understanding their function, their organization and control of metabolic pathways and networks that determine its physiology. Recent technical advances in acquiring genome-wide data have led to substantial progress in identifying gene functions. However, we still do not know the function of a large number of genes and, even when a gene product has been assigned to a functional class, we cannot normally predict its contribution to the phenotypic behaviour of the cell or organism--the phenome. In this study, we assessed bacterial growth parameters of 4030 non-redundant PA14 transposon mutants in the pathogenic bacterium Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The genome-wide simultaneous analysis of 119 distinct growth-related phenotypes uncovered a comprehensive phenome and provided evidence that most genotypes are not phenotypically isolated but rather define specific complex phenotypic clusters of genotypes. Since phenotypic overlap was demonstrated to reflect the relatedness of genotypes on a global scale, knowledge of an organism's phenome might significantly contribute to the advancement of functional genomics.
authors.affiliation: Chronic Pseudomonas Infections, Helmholtz Center for Infection Research, Braunschweig, Germany.
authors.forename: Claudia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Pommerenke
authors.forename: Mathias
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Müsken
authors.forename: Tanja
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Becker
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Dötsch
authors.forename: Frank
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Klawonn
authors.forename: Susanne
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Häussler
mesh_terms: D005798:Genes, Bacterial / Q000235:genetics*; D056726:Genetic Association Studies; D018613:Microscopy, Confocal; D011550:Pseudomonas aeruginosa / Q000235:genetics*