Autoinducer-2 relieves soil stress-induced dormancy of Bacillus velezensis by modulating sporulation signaling

Abstract The collective behavior of bacteria is regulated by quorum sensing (QS). Autoinducer-2 (AI-2) is a common QS signal that regulates the behavior of both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Despite the plethora of processes described to be influenced by AI-2 in diverse Gram-negative bac...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Qin Xiong, Huihui Zhang, Xia Shu, Xiting Sun, Haichao Feng, Zhihui Xu, Ákos T. Kovács, Ruifu Zhang, Yunpeng Liu
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Nature Portfolio 2024-11-01
Series:npj Biofilms and Microbiomes
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1038/s41522-024-00594-6
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Summary:Abstract The collective behavior of bacteria is regulated by quorum sensing (QS). Autoinducer-2 (AI-2) is a common QS signal that regulates the behavior of both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. Despite the plethora of processes described to be influenced by AI-2 in diverse Gram-negative bacteria, the AI-2-regulated processes in Bacilli are relatively unexplored. Here, we describe a novel function for AI-2 in Bacillus velezensis SQR9 related to the sporulation. AI-2 inhibited the initiation of sporulation through the phosphatase RapC and the DNA binding regulator ComA. Using biochemistry experiments, we demonstrated that AI-2 interacts with RapC to stimulate its binding to ComA, which leads to an inactive ComA and subsequently a sporulation inhibition. The AI-2 molecule could be shared across species for inhibiting Bacillus sporulation and it also plays the same role in different soil conditions. Our study revealed a novel function and regulatory mechanism of AI-2 in inhibiting sporulation in Bacilli.
ISSN:2055-5008