Essentiality of sterol synthesis genes in the planctomycete bacterium Gemmata obscuriglobus
Essentiality of sterol synthesis genes in the planctomycete bacterium Gemmata obscuriglobus
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DOI:
10.1038/s41467-019-10983-7
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发表时间:
2019-07
影响因子:
16.6
通讯作者:
Elena Rivas-Marín;Sean Stettner;Ekaterina Y. Gottshall;Carlos Santana-Molina;M. Helling;F. Basile;N. Ward;D. Devos
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文献类型:
--
作者:
Elena Rivas-Marín;Sean Stettner;Ekaterina Y. Gottshall;Carlos Santana-Molina;M. Helling;F. Basile;N. Ward;D. Devos
Sterols and hopanoids are chemically and structurally related lipids mostly found in eukaryotic and bacterial cell membranes. Few bacterial species have been reported to produce sterols and this anomaly had originally been ascribed to lateral gene transfer (LGT) from eukaryotes. In addition, the functions of sterols in these bacteria are unknown and the functional overlap between sterols and hopanoids is still unclear.Gemmata obscuriglobusis a bacterium from thePlanctomycetesphylum that synthesizes sterols, in contrast to its hopanoid-producing relatives. Here we show that sterols are essential for growth ofG. obscuriglobus, and that sterol depletion leads to aberrant membrane structures and defects in budding cell division. This report of sterol essentiality in a prokaryotic species advances our understanding of sterol distribution and function, and provides a foundation to pursue fundamental questions in evolutionary cell biology.