Page 149 - The Biochemistry of Inorganic Polyphosphates

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WU095/Kulaev
WU095-08
Pseudomonas aeruginosa 133
10 140
120
1
100
OD 540 0.1 80
Growth, 60 PolyP (nmol (mg protein −1 ))

0.01 40
20

0.001 0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Time (h)

Figure 8.7 Growth and PolyP accumulation by the Pseudomonas aeruginosa strain 8830 in L broth
(Kim et al., 1998).

Figure 8.8 PolyP accumulation in Pseudomonas aeruginosa, with accumulation induced in a low-
phosphate MOPS medium by the addition of serine hydroxamate: (1) algR2 mutant complemented
with plasmid GWS95 with the ndk gene, encoding the nucleoside diphosphate kinase; (2) algR2
mutant (Kim et al., 1998).

GTP, ppGpp and PolyP (Kim et al., 1998). During the growth in L broth, the bulk of
PolyP accumulation in a stable mucoid alginate-producing strain took place at the onset of
the stationary phase and continued into the late stationary phase (Figure 8.7). This strain
accumulated a large amount of PolyP under stringent response evoked by the addition of
serine hydroxamate (Figure 8.8). However, the non-mucouid mutant with AlgR2 deficiency
accumulated about 10 % as much PolyP under similar conditions (Kim et al., 1998). Thus,
the genetic switch that turns on alginate synthesis in Pseudomonas aeruginosa also turns
on PolyP synthesis. A hyperexpression of the nucleotide phosphate kinase (NDK) gene