Psychrophilic essential genes

这项建议描述了一项研究计划，该计划结合了对嗜冷(嗜寒)细菌生物学的研究，并发现了可用于设计用于医药和工业的微生物的必需基因的变种。生活在北极等持续寒冷环境中的细菌通常会在中等(10-30摄氏度)的温度下被杀死。这种现象可能是由于一种必需的蛋白质失活所致，而这种蛋白质是生存所必需的。在本申请中，我们提出实验来测试这一假设是否属实。此外，我们还在最近从北极细菌中分离必要基因的工作基础上再接再厉。通过研究这些基因编码的蛋白质的性质，我们希望了解北极细菌在低温下死亡的原因，并确定不同细菌物种之间细菌死亡的机制是否不同。这项基础研究具有实际应用，特别是在将引起疾病的细菌改造成安全形式方面。

This proposal describes a research program that combines the study of the biology of psychrophilic (cold-loving) bacteria with the discovery of variants of essential genes that can be used to engineer microbes used in medicine and industry. Bacteria that live in constantly cold environments, such as the Arctic, are usually killed at moderate (10-30°C) temperatures. This phenomenon is presumably due to the inactivation of an essential protein that is needed for viability. In this application we propose experiments to test if this presumption is true. As well, we build on our recent work in isolating essential genes from Arctic bacteria. By studying the properties of the proteins that these genes encode we hope to learn why Arctic bacteria die at low temperatures, and to determine if the mechanism of bacterial death is different among different bacterial species. This basic research has practical applications, especially in engineering disease causing bacteria into safe forms.