The Cyclic AMP Receptor Protein Regulates Quorum Sensing and Global Gene Expression in Yersinia pestis during Planktonic Growth and Growth in Biofilms.

Cyclic AMP (cAMP) receptor protein (Crp) is an important transcriptional regulator of Yersinia pestis Expression of crp increases during pneumonic plague as the pathogen depletes glucose and forms large biofilms within lungs. To better understand control of Y. pestis Crp, we determined a 1.8-Å crystal structure of the protein-cAMP complex. We found that compared to Escherichia coli Crp, C helix amino acid substitutions in Y. pestis Crp did not impact the cAMP dependency of Crp to bind DNA promoters. To investigate Y. pestis Crp-regulated genes during plague pneumonia, we performed RNA sequencing on both wild-type and Δcrp mutant bacteria growing in planktonic and biofilm states in minimal media with glucose or glycerol. Y. pestis Crp was found to dramatically alter expression of hundreds of genes in a manner dependent upon carbon source and growth state. Gel shift assays confirmed direct regulation of the malT and ptsG promoters, and Crp was then linked to Y. pestis growth on maltose as a sole carbon source. Iron regulation genes ybtA and fyuA were found to be indirectly regulated by Crp. A new connection between carbon source and quorum sensing was revealed as Crp was found to regulate production of acyl-homoserine lactones (AHLs) through direct and indirect regulation of genes for AHL synthetases and receptors. AHLs were subsequently identified in the lungs of Y. pestis-infected mice when crp expression was highest in Y. pestis biofilms. Thus, in addition to the well-studied pla gene, other Crp-regulated genes likely have important functions during plague infection.IMPORTANCE Bacterial pathogens have evolved extensive signaling pathways to translate environmental signals into changes in gene expression. While Crp has long been appreciated for its role in regulating metabolism of carbon sources in many bacterial species, transcriptional profiling has revealed that this protein regulates many other aspects of bacterial physiology. The plague pathogen Y. pestis requires this global regulator to survive in blood, skin, and lungs. During disease progression, this organism adapts to changes within these niches. In addition to regulating genes for metabolism of nonglucose sugars, we found that Crp regulates genes for virulence, metal acquisition, and quorum sensing by direct or indirect mechanisms. Thus, this single transcriptional regulator, which responds to changes in available carbon sources, can regulate multiple critical behaviors for causing disease.

Depletion of Glucose Activates Catabolite Repression during Pneumonic Plague.

Bacterial pathogenesis depends on changes in metabolic and virulence gene expression in response to changes within a pathogen's environment. The plague-causing pathogen, Yersinia pestis, requires expression of the gene encoding the Pla protease for progression of pneumonic plague. The catabolite repressor protein Crp, a global transcriptional regulator, may serve as the activator of pla in response to changes within the lungs as disease progresses. By using gene reporter fusions, the spatial and temporal activation of the crp and pla promoters was measured in a mouse model of pneumonic plague. In the lungs, crp was highly expressed in bacteria found within large aggregates resembling biofilms, while pla expression increased over time independent of the aggregated state. Increased expression of crp and pla correlated with a reduction in lung glucose levels. Deletion of the glucose-specific phosphotransferase system EIIBC (PtsG) of Y. pestis rescued glucose levels in the lungs, resulting in reduced expression of both crp and pla We propose that activation of pla expression during pneumonic plague is driven by an increase of both Crp and cAMP levels following consumption of available glucose in the lungs by Y. pestis Thus, Crp operates as a sensor linking the nutritional environment of the host to regulation of virulence gene expression.IMPORTANCE Using Yersinia pestis as a model for pneumonia, we discovered that glucose is rapidly consumed, leading to a catabolite-repressive environment in the lungs. As a result, expression of the gene encoding the plasminogen activator protease, a target of the catabolite repressor protein required for Y. pestis pathogenesis, is activated. Interestingly, expression of the catabolite repressor protein itself was also increased in the absence of glucose but only in biofilms. The data presented here demonstrate how a bacterial pathogen senses changes within its environment to coordinate metabolism and virulence gene expression.

Mechanism and Thermodynamics of Reductive Cleavage of Carbon-Halogen Bonds in the Polybrominated Aliphatic Electrophiles.

Quantum-mechanical computations revealed that, despite the presence of electron-withdrawing and/or π-acceptor substituents, the lowest unoccupied molecular orbitals (LUMO) of the polybromosubstituted aliphatic molecules R-Br (R-Br = C3Br2F6, CBr3NO2, CBr3CN, CBr3CONH2, CBr3CO2H, CHBr3, CFBr3, CBr4, CBr3COCBr3) are delocalized mostly over their bromine-containing fragments. The singly occupied molecular orbitals in the corresponding vertically excited anion radicals (R-Br(•-))* are characterized by essentially the same shapes and show nodes in the middle of the C-Br bonds. An injection of an electron into the antibonding LUMO results in the barrierless dissociation of the anion-radical species and the concerted reductive cleavages of C-Br bonds leading to the formation of the loosely bonded {R(•)···Br(-)} associates. The interaction energies between the fragments of these ion-radical pairs vary from ∼10 to 20 kcal mol(-1) in the gas phase and from 1 to 3 kcal mol(-1) in acetonitrile. In accord with the concerted mechanism of reductive cleavage, all R-Br molecules showed completely irreversible reduction waves in the voltammograms in the whole range of the scan rates employed (from 0.05 to 5 V s(-1)). Also, the transfer coefficients α, established from the width of these waves and dependence of reduction peak potentials Ep on the scan rates, were significantly lower than 0.5. The standard reduction potentials of the R-Br electrophiles, E(o)R-Br/R·+X(-), and the corresponding R(•) radicals, E(o)R(•)/R(-), were calculated in acetonitrile using the appropriate thermodynamic cycles. In agreement with these calculations, which indicated that the R(•) radicals resulting from the reductive cleavage of the R-Br molecules are stronger oxidants than their parents, the reduction peaks' currents in cyclic voltammograms were consistent with the two-electron transfer processes.

Posttranscriptional regulation of the Yersinia pestis cyclic AMP receptor protein Crp and impact on virulence.

UNLABELLED: The cyclic AMP receptor protein (Crp) is a transcriptional regulator that controls the expression of numerous bacterial genes, usually in response to environmental conditions and particularly by sensing the availability of carbon. In the plague pathogen Yersinia pestis, Crp regulates the expression of multiple virulence factors, including components of the type III secretion system and the plasminogen activator protease Pla. The regulation of Crp itself, however, is distinctly different from that found in the well-studied Escherichia coli system. Here, we show that at physiological temperatures, the synthesis of Crp in Y. pestis is positively regulated at the posttranscriptional level. The loss of the small RNA chaperone Hfq results in decreased Crp protein levels but not in steady-state Crp transcript levels, and this regulatory effect occurs within the 5' untranslated region (UTR) of the Crp mRNA. The posttranscriptional activation of Crp synthesis is required for the expression of pla, and decoupling crp from Hfq through the use of an exogenously controlled promoter and 5' UTR increases Pla protein levels as well as partially rescues the growth defect associated with the loss of Hfq. Finally, we show that both Hfq and the posttranscriptional regulation of Crp contribute to the virulence of Y. pestis during pneumonic plague. The Hfq-dependent, posttranscriptional regulation of Crp may be specific to Yersinia species, and thus our data help explain the dramatic growth and virulence defects associated with the loss of Hfq in Y. pestis. IMPORTANCE: The Crp protein is a major transcriptional regulator in bacteria, and its synthesis is tightly controlled to avoid inappropriate induction of the Crp regulon. In this report, we provide the first evidence of Crp regulation in an Hfq-dependent manner at the posttranscriptional level. Our discovery that the synthesis of Crp in Yersinia pestis is Hfq dependent adds an additional layer of regulation to catabolite repression in this bacterium. Our work provides a mechanism by which the plague pathogen links not just the sensing of glucose or other carbon sources but also other signals that influence Crp abundance via the expression of small RNAs to the induction of the Crp regulon. In turn, this allows Y. pestis to fine-tune Crp levels to optimize virulence gene expression during plague infection and may allow the bacterium to adapt to its unique environmental niches.

Experimental and computational probes of the nature of halogen bonding: complexes of bromine-containing molecules with bromide anions.

The nature of halogen bonding is examined via experimental and computational characterizations of a series of associates between electrophilic bromocarbons R-Br (R-Br=CBr3F, CBr3NO2, CBr3COCBr3, CBr3CONH2, CBr3CN, etc.) and bromide anions. The [R-Br, Br(-)] complexes show intense absorption bands in the 200-350 nm range which follow the same Mulliken correlation as those observed for the charge-transfer associates of bromide anions with common organic π-acceptors. For a wide range of the associates, intermolecular R-Br···Br(-) separations decrease and intramolecular C-Br bond lengths increase proportionally to the Br(-)→R-Br charge transfer; and the energies of R-Br···Br(-) bonds are correlated with the linear combination of orbital (charge-transfer) and electrostatic interactions. On the whole, spectral, structural and thermodynamic characteristics of the [R-Br, Br(-)] complexes indicate that besides electrostatics, the orbital (charge-transfer) interactions play a vital role in the R-Br···Br(-) halogen bonding. This indicates that in addition to controlling the geometries of supramolecular assemblies, halogen bonding leads to electronic coupling between interacting species, and thus affects reactivity of halogenated molecules, as well as conducting and magnetic properties of their solid-state materials.

Substituent-induced switch of the role of charge-transfer complexes in the Diels-Alder reactions of o-chloranil and styrenes.

Addition of p-substituted styrenes, XSty (X = H, Me, MeO, or Cl) to the solutions of o-chloranil, oCA, in dichloromethane resulted in the transient formation of the charge-transfer complexes, [XSty, oCA], followed by the Diels-Alder reaction. At low temperatures, these reactions led to formation of essentially pure endocycloadducts. As expected for the inverse-electron-demand Diels-Alder reaction, the rate constants of the cycloaddition rose with the increase of the donor strength. However, while facile cycloaddition took place in the neat mixtures of the o-chloranil with p-methyl, p-chloro-, or unsubstituted styrenes at low temperatures, a similar system involving the strongest MeOSty donor was surprisingly persistent. X-ray structural measurements and quantum-mechanical computations indicated that this anomaly is related to the fact that the diene/dienophile orientation in the charge-transfer [MeOSty, oCA] complex is opposite to that in the endocycloadduct and in the lowest-energy transition state leading to this isomer. Thus, the proceeding of the cycloaddition requires dissociation of the (dead-end) complex. For the systems involving the oCA diene and either the HSty, ClSty, or MeSty dienophile, the donor/acceptor arrangements in the charge-transfer complexes apparently are consistent with that in the corresponding products, and the formation of these complexes does not hinder the Diels-Alder reaction.