RESEARCH ARTICLE


Isolation of the Bacteriophage DinoHI from Dichelobacter nodosus and its Interactions with other Integrated Genetic Elements



Brian F Cheetham*, 1, Dane Parker2, Garry A Bloomfield1, Bruce E Shaw1, Megan Sutherland1, Jessica A Hyman1, Jenifer Druitt1, Ruth M Kennan2, Julian I Rood2, Margaret E Katz1
1 Molecular and Cellular Biology, University of New England, Armidale, NSW, 2351, Australia
2 Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Structural and Functional Microbial Genomics and Victorian Bioinformatics Consortium, Department of Microbiology, Monash University, Clayton, Vic., 3800, Australia


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Creative Commons License
2008 Bentham Science Publishers Ltd.

open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5/), which permits unrestrictive use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

* Address correspondence to this author at the Molecular and Cellular Biology, University of New England, Armidale, NSW, 2351, Australia; Tel: 61 2 6773 3394; Fax: 61 2 6773 3267; E-mail: bcheetha@une.edu.au


Abstract

The Gram-negative anaerobic pathogen Dichelobacter nodosus carries several genetic elements that integrate into the chromosome. These include the intA, intB, intC and intD elements, which integrate adjacent to csrA and pnpA, two putative global regulators of virulence and the virulence-related locus, vrl, which integrates into ssrA. Treatment of D. nodosus strains with ultraviolet light resulted in the isolation of DinoHI, a member of the Siphoviridae and the first bacteriophage to be identified in D. nodosus. Part of the DinoHI genome containing the packaging site is found in all D. nodosus strains tested and is located at the end of the vrl, suggesting a role for DinoHI in the transfer of the vrl by transduction. Like the intB element, the DinoHI genome contains a copy of regA which has similarity to the repressors of lambdoid bacteriophages, suggesting that the maintenance of DinoHI and the intB element may be co-ordinately controlled.