The sabotage of the bacterial transcription machinery by a small bacteriophage protein.
Many bacteriophages produce small proteins that specifically interfere with the bacterial host transcription machinery and thus contribute to the acquisition of the bacterial cell by the bacteriophage. We recently described how a small protein, called P7, produced by the Xp10 bacteriophage inhibits bacterial transcription initiation by causing the dissociation of the promoter specificity sigma factor subunit from the host RNA polymerase holoenzyme. In this addendum to the original publication, we present the highlights of that research.
MRC Centre for Molecular Bacteriology and Infection; Imperial College London; London, UK.
Bing
B
Liu
MRC Centre for Molecular Bacteriology and Infection; Imperial College London; London, UK.
Andrey
A
Shadrin
MRC Centre for Molecular Bacteriology and Infection; Imperial College London; London, UK.
Carol
C
Sheppard
Waksman Institute for Microbiology and Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry; Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Piscataway, NJ USA.
Vladimir
V
Mekler
MRC Centre for Molecular Bacteriology and Infection; Imperial College London; London, UK.
Yingqi
Y
Xu
Waksman Institute for Microbiology and Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry; Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey; Piscataway, NJ USA ; St. Petersburg State Polytechnical University; St. Petersburg, Russia.
Konstantin
K
Severinov
MRC Centre for Molecular Bacteriology and Infection; Imperial College London; London, UK.
Steve
S
Matthews
MRC Centre for Molecular Bacteriology and Infection; Imperial College London; London, UK.
Sivaramesh
S
Wigneshweraraj
bacterial RNA polymerase; bacteriophage; inhibitor; sigma factor; transcription